This is the full text of Justice Tony Fitzgerald’s speech launching my book ‘Not happy John! Defending our democracy’, at Gleebooks in Sydney on June 22. Michelle Grattan reported on the speech today at Fitzgerald berates both sides of politics

 

In a speech last year, the author Norman Mailer described democracy as �a state of grace that is attained only by those countries which have a host of individuals not only ready to enjoy freedom but to undergo the heavy labor of maintaining it�. Not Happy John! is Margo Kingston�s admirable contribution to the �heavy labor� of maintaining democracy in Australia.

As the title hints, Margo has focused her analysis on the behaviour of the current Commonwealth government, especially the Prime Minister. In the words of the publisher: �Not Happy, John! is a gutsy, anecdotal book with a deadly serious purpose: to lay bare the insidious ways in which John Howard�s government has profoundly undermined our freedoms and our rights. She doesn�t care whether you vote Liberal or Labor, Greens or One Nation. She isn�t interested in the old, outworn left – right rhetoric. What she�s passionate about is the urgent need for us to reassert the core civic values of a humane, egalitarian, liberal democracy.�

You will observe the force of Margo�s argument when you read her book, as obviously you should. My brief remarks will be directed to the damage that mainstream politicians generally are doing to our democracy.

Australians generally accept that democracy is the best system of government, the market is the most efficient mechanism for economic activity and fair laws are the most powerful instrument for creating and maintaining a society that is free, rational and just. However, we are also collectively conscious that democracy is fragile, the market is amoral and law is an inadequate measure of responsibility. As former Chief Justice Warren of the United States Supreme Court explained: “Law �.. presupposes the existence of a broad area of human conduct controlled only by ethical norms.�

Similarly, democracy in our tradition assumes that a broad range of political activity is controlled only by conventions of proper conduct. Especially because individual rights are not constitutionally guaranteed in this country, justice, equality and other fundamental community values in Australia are constantly vulnerable to the disregard of those conventions.

Since the sacking of the Whitlam Government in 1975, the major political parties seem to have largely abandoned the ethics of government. A spiteful, divisive contest now dominates the national conversation, and democracy struggles incessantly with populism. Mainstream political parties routinely shirk their duty of maintaining democracy in Australia.

This is nowhere more obvious than in what passes for political debate, in which it is regarded as not only legitimate but clever to mislead. Although effective democracy depends on the participation of informed citizens, modern political discourse is corrupted by pervasive deception. It is a measure of the deep cynicism in our party political system that many of the political class deride those who support the evolution of Australia as a fair, tolerant, compassionate society and a good world citizen as an un-Australian, �bleeding-heart� elite, and that the current government inaccurately describes itself as conservative and liberal.

It is neither.

It exhibits a radical disdain for both liberal thought and fundamental institutions and conventions. No institution is beyond stacking and no convention restrains the blatant advancement of ideology. The tit-for-tat attitude each side adopts means that the position will probably change little when the opposition gains power at some future time. A decline in standards will continue if we permit it.

Without ethical leadership, those of us who are comfortably insulated from the harsh realities of violence, disability, poverty and discrimination seem to have experienced a collective failure of imagination. Relentless change and perceptions of external threat make conformity and order attractive and incremental erosions of freedom tolerable to those who benefit from the status quo and are apprehensive of others who are different and therefore easily misunderstood.

Mainstream Australians remain unreconciled with Indigenous Australians and largely ignore their just claims.

Without any coherent justification, we are participating in a war in a distant country in which more than half the population are children, some of whom, inevitably, are being killed. In our own country, many live in poverty, children are hungry and homeless and other severely traumatized children are in detention in flagrant breach of the Convention on the Rights of the Child simply because they were brought here by their parents seeking a better life.

Politicians mesmerised by power seem to be unconcerned that, when leaders fail to set and follow ethical standards, public trust is damaged, community expectations diminish and social divisions expand. However, these matters are important to the rest of us. We are a community, not merely a collection of self-interested individuals. Justice, integrity and trust in fundamental institutions are essential social assets and social capital is as important as economic prosperity.

In order to perform our democratic function, we need, and are entitled to, the truth. Nothing is more important to the functioning of democracy than informed discussion and debate. Yet a universal aim of the power-hungry is to stifle dissent. Most of us are easily silenced, through a sense of futility if not personal concern.

Margo has the knowledge, energy and courage to stand up for her beliefs. Congratulations, Margo, for doing much more than your share of the �heavy labor� of maintaining Australia�s democracy. It is a privilege to launch �Not Happy John!�, to urge all to read it and to wish you and �Not Happy John!� every success.

***

POSTSCRIPT: in Tony’s written speech but not delivered at the launch

There are currently 162 children in immigration detention in mainland Australia and on Nauru and Christmas Island.

The recently published report by the HEREOC National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention (A Last Resort, 2004) attests that “Australian laws that require the mandatory immigration detention of children and the way these laws are administered by the Commonwealth, have resulted in numerous and repeated breaches of the Convention on the Rights of the Child”.

Findings by the Inquiry confirm what those of us who have sustained contact with some of the children now released have known for some time, namely that “the traumatic nature of the detention experience has out-stripped any previous trauma that the children have had”. It observed that:

“Children in detention exhibited symptoms including bed-wetting, sleep walking and night terrors. At the severe end of the spectrum, some children became mute, refused to eat and drink, made suicide attempts and began to self-harm, such as by cutting themselves.”

With respect to some children the Inquiry found that:

“The Department of Immigration failed to implement the clear – and in some cases repeated – recommendations of State agencies and mental health experts that they be urgently transferred out of detention centres with their parents. This amounted to cruel,inhuman and degrading treatment.”

Detention of children places extreme stress on their parents. Those we have come to know have expressed this to us. They felt responsible and guilty for bringing their children to Australia ,where instead of finding freedom and the new home they had promised their children, they were being held in “a prison”.

As the Inquiry stated “being in detenion can severely undermine the ability of parents to care for their children”. Their normal roles in the family are taken away from them. Often too the parents are severely traumatized by the experience of detention, which reduces their ability to parent their children.

Children in detention have witnessed extreme forms of violence, riots, suicide attempts and self harm. Some have been tear gassed and struck by batons during riots. The Inquiry found that “the Commonwealth had breached the Convention on the Rights of the Child by failing to take all appropriate measures to protect children in detention from physical and mental violence”.

Other measures which I would describe as inhumane and dehumanizing include giving children ( and their parents) a number which they must wear at all times and by which they are known and called; not allowing parents to take any photos of their children…..so babies born in detention have no photos recording their growth and development, something most parents take for granted.

That a society which calls itself civilized continues to countenance the prolonged and indeterminate detention of children in conditions closely resembling those of a high security prison , shocks me profoundly. That this society is Australia, saddens and angers me more than I can say.

Senator Brian Harradine and I have had several disagreements over the years, particularly on family planning issues, but we have come to like and respect each other. Last year Brian saved Australia�s only law to protect the diversity of ownership of Australia�s media, for which I will be forever grateful (see The debate that dare not speak its name and Brian Harradine: The voice of reason on media laws).

 

Brian is a major character in my book, in which I said of him:

�In my opinion, Brian Harradine is a statesman. If there�s one single politician I�d choose to have represent me on a vote of genuine bipartisan importance to Australia, it might just be him…

�Brian Harradine is a great Australian. One day someone will tell his story in the detail it deserves.�

Brian, the longest serving Senator in Australia�s Parliament, announced yesterday that he would retire. Here is his statement, and his summary of the highlights of his long and tumultuous political career.

***

HARRADINE STATEMENT

Senator Harradine will not recontest seat

I will not be recontesting my Tasmanian Senate seat at the next election. My term is due to end on 30 June 2005. I will leave the Senate as the longest serving senator in the current Parliament and the longest serving independent senator since Federation.

I have made this decision with some sadness and regret. After notifying my supporters of my intentions, I have received very strong appeals to reconsider. But I am sure they and other Tasmanians will understand that after reaching 30 years in the Senate next year, I would like to spend more time with my family. I would also like to concentrate on some writing, speaking engagements and bushwalking. (Margo: want to write for Webdiary, Brian?)

The Senator Brian Harradine Group will not be nominating another candidate for the election.

In my time in this place I have endeavoured to address public policy matters by applying a framework of social justice principles able to be understood and supported by all persons of goodwill who are committed to a just, free, equal, and life-affirming society.

When I was first elected to the Senate, I confronted a clear threat to the Australian way of life from Communists and the socialist left. From my first days in Parliament I urged a new and moderate path for Australia, arguing vigorously for economic justice for smaller states like Tasmania. I also demanded greater recognition and assistance for Australian families.

I am proud of my strong advocacy over the years for people suffering political oppression, for the rights of workers in Australia and overseas to organise, for initiatives to combat chronic unemployment and for assistance to refugees.

Throughout my parliamentary career I have sought to defend the dignity of the human person against attacks by those who promote a utilitarian philosophy.

In defending human dignity I have decried the objectification of women by the pornography and prostitution industries, tried to prevent the tragic destruction of unborn children through abortion and denounced the �what can be done should be done� technological imperative of some scientists experimenting on human embryos as though they are laboratory rats.

I am particularly proud of the role I have played in promoting and defending the Senate not as a rubber stamp for the government of the day, but as a true house of review scrutinising and refining the laws under which we all live. In the face of increasing centralisation of power, I have sought to ensure the Senate acts to protect the smaller states.

During the difficult GST debate, I remarked that you can be a rooster one day and a feather duster the next. But in recent times I have:

* secured $353 million for Tasmanians from the minority sales of Telstra. This money has contributed to the turn around in the Tasmanian economy;

* secured, as part of negotiations between the independents and the Government, an extra 1600 new university student places for Tasmanians by 2008, many of which will go to the state�s north and north west;

* brokered the Wik agreement which not only provided an equitable outcome for indigenous Australians, but also avoided a race-based election.

I will continue to strive to ensure Australia as a society measures up to the standard I have always espoused: that the measure of a civil society is how it treats its most vulnerable members.

***

Senator Brian Harradine: a short history

Family man

Born Richard William Brian Harradine on 9 January 1935 at Quorn, South Australia. His wife Barbara died in 1980 after 18 years of marriage, leaving behind Brian and their six children. He married Marian, a widow with seven children, in 1982. He and Marian now have 27 grandchildren. Marian and Brian Harradine share a love of bushwalking and have walked in most areas of Tasmania.

Work and Union

Brian�s first job was on the Commonwealth Railway�s (CR) Ghan and East West services. After parting company with the CR he worked with the Post Master General’s Department (PMG) – Engineering Division – in Adelaide.

In late 1959 Brian Harradine arrived in Tasmania as a union organiser with the Federated Clerks� Union. During his first weeks in Tasmania, Brian resided in the head office keeper�s quarters on the roof of the Franklin Square Government Offices building in central Hobart.

He was Secretary of the Tasmanian Trades and Labour Council and a member of the Australian Council of Trade Unions executive for twelve years from 1964 to 1976. He was also instrumental in changing the first of the Tasmanian Trades and Labour Council objectives to that of the International Labour Organisation (ILO): �To contribute to the development of an economic and social order in which people can live with freedom and dignity and pursue both their spiritual development and material well-being in conditions of economic security and equal opportunity.�

Founder of the Tasmanian branch of the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association and its president since 1967.

ALP member

Member of the ALP Tasmanian State Executive from 1965 to 1975.

Member of the Australian Labor Party Federal Executive from 1968 to 1975. Despite being repeatedly elected by the Tasmanian state conference of the ALP to the ALP Federal Executive, the socialist left voted to deny his right to sit on the Federal Executive for seven years. The Leader of the Opposition, Gough Whitlam, resigned as parliamentary leader to protest Brian Harradine�s treatment and was subsequently re-elected, defeating Dr Jim Cairns narrowly.

Expelled from the ALP by a 9-8 vote of the Federal Executive in September 1975. Prime Minister Gough Whitlam said at the time: �Harradine is the victim of perjured evidence.�

The Tasmanian ALP State Executive continued to support Brian Harradine. Rather than see further conflict between the Tasmanian branch and the Federal Executive, and to avoid possible Federal Executive intervention in the Tasmanian branch, Brian Harradine decided to appeal over the heads of the Federal Executive to the Tasmanian people and run for the Senate as an independent.

Independent Senator for Tasmania

Elected as a Tasmanian member of the Senate in 1975 as the first independent to win a Senate seat on primary votes. Senator Harradine achieved nearly two Senate quotas. Since elected to the Senate for six consecutive terms.

When elected he said he held no animosity towards the Labor Party. �In politics or the trade union movement, it is counter-productive,� he said.

He marked his first day in Parliament (17 February 1976) by deliberately taking the seat of the Opposition Leader, Gough Whitlam, at the centre table opposite the Prime Minister. Labor MPs and senators had boycotted the official opening of Parliament by Governor General Sir John Kerr. Senator Harradine said at the time: �Cabinet ministers started filling the front benches usually occupied by the Opposition. I felt this was too much and a position had been reached where the Government was getting it all its own way. I am sure many Labor supporters in Australia will be pleased that an Opposition presence was made.�

Balance of power

Between July 1981 and December 1984 Senator Harradine�s vote could become a deciding one, depending on whether the Democrat vote split.

Between December 1994 and March 1996, Senator Harradine�s vote, combined with the ALP, Democrats and Greens, was sufficient to carry legislation. If Senator Harradine voted with Senator Devereux and the Coalition, their combined vote was sufficient to defeat legislation. After September 1995 the vote of independent Senator Crichton-Brown (Margo: expelled from the Liberal Party) was also necessary to defeat Government legislation.

Between August 1996 and June 1999, Senator Harradine�s vote combined with Senator Colston�s and the Coalition Government was sufficient to carry legislation.

Between July 2002 and the present, Senator Harradine�s vote combined with the votes of Senators Murphy, Lees, Harris and the Coalition Government passes legislation.

In all Senate situations, irrespective of balance of power considerations, Senator Harradine has consistently argued the need to debate issues on their merits.

Some key events

In November 1976 Senator Harradine moved an urgency motion in the Senate to note that Queenstown was facing a 40 per cent cut in its workforce as a result of job cuts at the Mount Lyell mine on Tasmania�s west coast. Senator Harradine was subsequently appointed to the Select Committee on the Operations of the Mount Lyell Company. The Committee reported in December. The company�s financial problems were largely addressed by the Government�s decision in November to devalue the Australian dollar. The Committee recommended the Government consider further support for the copper industry. The company responded by halving its planned retrenchments.

In February 1978 Senator Harradine called for the establishment of an Australian coast guard. �The current method of maritime sovereignty enforcement is inefficient, wasteful and a drain on Australian defence capabilities. Naval patrols and aerial surveillance equipment are wastefully under-utilised in the essentially civil tasks involved in fisheries patrols and Australian law enforcement offshore�. The coast guard would address the problem of illegal foreign fishing boats and drug running. He also called for some of the manufacture of the coast guard fleet to be undertaken in Tasmania.

In August 1980 Senator Harradine presented what was described at the time as a �massive� petition of over 22,000 Australians to the Senate calling for the restoration of the value of family allowances. He has spoken on family allowances and the need to provide adequate support to families since 1976. The importance of this issue in the electorate was reflected in his record vote achieved in the 1980 Federal Election.

In June 1982 Senator Harradine chaired the Senate Select Committee on Industrial Relations Legislation. He reported to the Senate in October 1982 that the Committee found:

“The proposed legislation is an undesirable and unwarranted intervention into the field of industrial relations, particularly at a time when high levels of unemployment have already disturbed this balance. The Committee believes quite firmly that viable unions are essential for the operation of Australia’s system of conciliation and arbitration.”

In May 1985 Senator Harradine introduced a private members bill � the Human Embryo Experimentation Bill 1985, along with a petition with 100,000 signatures supporting it. The Bill sought to ban destructive experimentation on human embryos and anticipated by 17 years the debate over the Research Involving Human Embryos Act 2002. A Senate committee reported on the Bill in October 1986, recommending a ban on destructive research on human embryos, but the Bill was not given time for debate.

On 17 August 1989, as Chair of the Parliamentary Pro-Life Group, Senator Harradine supported the introduction of the Abortion Funding Abolition Bill 1989 into the House of Representatives. The Bill would have ended Medicare funding of abortion. The Bill was not given time for debate.

In September 1990 Senator Harradine successfully moved an amendment to the Patents Act to ensure that �Human beings, and the biological processes for their generation, are not patentable inventions�.

In August 1993 Senator Harradine criticised the government for having �no plans to compensate Tasmanians for the increased costs across Bass Strait through proper adjustment of the freight equalisation scheme�. The Tasmanian Freight Equalisation Scheme was adjusted in the 1993-94 federal budget as part of negotiations between Treasurer John Dawkins and Senator Harradine. A Department of the Parliamentary Library budget review paper recorded �an agreement was made with Senator Harradine for the provision of a further $2 million per year for four years to alleviate Bass Strait shipping costs. This resulted in a 5% increase in TFES rates of assistance�.

In May 1996 Senator Harradine successfully moved an amendment to the Therapeutic Goods Amendment Bill 1996 (No. 2) which ensures that abortion-inducing drugs cannot be imported into Australia without the express permission of the Federal Health Minister, rather than it being the decision of a departmental officer.

On 4 December 1996 Senator Harradine successfully moved an amendment to the Higher Education Legislation Amendment Bill to ensure that the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) debt repayment threshold takes account of families. The income threshold at which HECS debts start to be repaid increased from the basic $20,700 to $23,478 for those graduates with a spouse, to $25,749 for those graduates with one child and so on. This takes account of graduates� capacity to pay.

On 11 December 1996 Senator Harradine supported the Telstra (Dilution of Public Ownership) Act 1996 (T1) which secured $183 million for Tasmanians for an unprecedented program combining environmental protection with technological advancement. This money was used to establish 59 on-line access centres throughout Tasmania, Telehealth centres, the Tasmanian Electronic Commerce Centre, Tasmanian Business On-line, landcare projects, walking tracks and facilities in the World Heritage area, National Parks and other Natural Heritage Trust projects.

In June 1997 Senator Harradine was instrumental in the establishment of an inquiry to examine the fairness of the settlement offered by the Commonwealth Government to recipients of human pituitary hormones who had contracted or were at risk of contracting the incurable Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD). The inquiry also heard damning evidence that CSL and other Government bodies failed to protect public safety. (Senate Community Affairs References Committee Report on the CJD Settlement Offer, October 1997). Senator Harradine called for a more wide ranging examination of the issue of contaminated blood, which had wreaked havoc in the lives of so many innocent people.

In July 1998 Senator Harradine negotiated a compromise to balance preserving native title rights and a new system for the recognition and operation of native title. This negotiation helped to avoid a divisive race-based election that could have played into the hands of extremists. The agreement he crafted led to the longest Parliamentary debate since Federation on a particular measure – the Native Title Amendment Bill 1997 (No.2), known as the Wik debate.

In an opinion piece, Senator Harradine said:

�The ultimate result of the Wik debate is bipartisan acceptance of native title as a legitimate part of Australian law – a remarkable achievement given the vehemence with which the High Court was attacked after Mabo and Wik � the compromise I negotiated benefited indigenous Australians. It also held the line against attempts to further erode native title rights while delivering positive benefits such as the ability to negotiate Indigenous Land Use Agreements, improved claims and registration processes, and reaffirmation of the operation -of the Racial Discrimination Act.�

In July 1998 Senator Harradine�s persistent efforts to secure an inter-country adoption agreement between Australia and China were successful, allowing the adoption of Chinese children by Australian couples for the first time.

In May 1999 Senator Harradine prompted a Senate Inquiry into the operation of Australia�s Refugee and Humanitarian Programme after exposing the deportation of an 8 � month pregnant Chinese woman who was aborted on arrival in China. The Committee report A Sanctuary Under Review: An Examination of Australia’s Refugee and Humanitarian Determination Processes was completed in June 2000.

On 14 May 1999 Senator Harradine announced he would not support the Government�s GST package:

�But one thing can be guaranteed, and that is that the goods and services tax, once enshrined in legislation, will never be removed. Decisions we make now on this issue are not for the next three years; we are making decisions here that will affect generations. The question that I have to ask myself is whether I am going to be a party to imposing an impersonal, indiscriminate tax on my children, my grandchildren and their children for generations to come. I cannot.�

In May 1999 Senator Harradine reached agreement with the Government for his support for the Online Content Co-Regulatory Scheme. The Scheme was part of the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Bill 1999. The Scheme puts restrictions on Internet content that is likely to offend adults and was meant to provide for the protection of children from pornography.

On 21 June 1999 Senator Harradine supported the Telstra (Transition to Full Private Ownership) Bill 1998 (T2), negotiating another $150 million for Tasmanians, plus a further $20 million from Telstra. This led to funding for the Intelligent Island program, NetAlert to promote Internet safety to Australians, funding under the Networking the Nation program and the Launceston Broadband Project.

In June 2001 Senator Harradine called for the release of women, children and families seeking asylum, where their detention was not necessary for security or some other compelling reason, in a qualifying comment to the Human Rights Sub-Committee report on visits to immigration detention centres.

In February 2003 Senator Harradine opposed the war in Iraq on the grounds that he was not convinced that it satisfied the tests for a �just war�.

In June 2003 Senator Harradine successfully moved an amendment to the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Media Ownership) Bill 2002 to ensure that a media proprietor could not own both a television licence and a newspaper in the same mainland capital city. This contributed to the rejection of the Bill by the Government and the House of Representatives.

In September 2003 Senator Harradine negotiated with the Government to change Therapeutic Goods Regulations to ensure that consumers will be informed if human embryos, human embryonic stem cells or materials derived from embryos or stem cells are used in the manufacture or testing of pharmaceuticals. Consumers can then make an informed decision as to whether they want to use these drugs. The Government agreed to require pharmaceutical companies to provide plain English advice in Product Information (pamphlets for medical professionals) and Consumer Medicine Information (pamphlets for consumers), which are available for all registered drugs in Australia. This was a world first.

On 24 October 2003 Senator Harradine boycotted a special joint sitting of parliament convened to hear Chinese President Hu Jintao in protest against continuing and appalling breaches of human rights committed by the Chinese government. Senator Harradine said the parliamentary address set a precedent by honouring the head of a totalitarian regime in the elected chamber and he could not take part.

In December 2003 Senator Harradine and his three independent colleagues negotiated with the Government over the Higher Education Support Bill to achieve a variety of benefits including an increase in the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) income repayment threshold from $24,000 to $35,000. The Bill secured more than $200 million in benefits over six years for Tasmanians, including an extra 1600 new university student places for the state.

In March 2004 Senator Harradine and his three independent colleagues negotiated with the Government to secure an extra $427 million in improvements to MedicarePlus. This included ensuring Tasmania had the higher $7.50 bulk billing incentive across Tasmania and ensuring an extra 6,600 individuals and families in Tasmania get access to the safety net. Improving the coverage of the safety net was the only concrete way, barring the Government properly investing in Medicare, of making sure lower income people are safe from the burden of high medical bills.

G’day. A number a readers have complained about a line in On the road again in response to a query from Tim and Anna-Maria Stephens:

“Hi Margo. Please see below our e-mail to Minister Downer today concerning Australia’s vote in the UN General Assembly on the West Bank wall. This one has really slipped under the radar. Why, we can all ask, was there no public debate about this? (Margo: Because the fundamentalist Zionist lobby controls politics and the media in the US and Australia. A chapter in my book by Antony Loewenstein includes an indictment of the tactics of these people by Bob Carr.)

As you know, I routinely publish complaints about my work, of which there were many during last year’s debate on the Ashrawi affair (for example, see Ashrawi leaves behind a fresh air debate on the Israel Palestine question and More than two sides to Ashrawi fallout story.)

But this time, most complaints were marked ‘not for publication’ and went straight to the editor, demanding that I be sacked for “anti-Semitic Jew baiting” and “incitement to racial hatred”. I was also accused of “the kind of language and views that I might expect to find in some diatribe by Goebbels”. Another complainant said that my “comments come straight out of Czarist Russia”.

A number of colleagues at the Sydney Morning Herald also wrote to me privately expressing their distaste for my remarks. The suggestion that “the fundamentalist Zionist lobby controls politics and the media in the US and Australia” was “not true now – and nor was it true when a secret group of “fundamentalist” Russian Jews, who planned to set up a Jewish world state, were alleged to have declared that “the Press, with a few exceptions, is already entirely in our hands”.

The only complaint not marked NFP was from Paul Williams, who wrote: “Well done Margo, straight from the annals of Nazi propaganda. Tell me, do the Jews control the banks and international finance as well?”

Obviously, I did not mean what many people believed I meant. I am not anti-semitic, and I thought what I wrote was a statement of fact. Is there a language problem here? So I read more about Zionism, its history and its various meanings at Wikipedia and corresponded with two Jewish Australians of my acquaintance to work out where I’d gone wrong.

One, who wishes to remain anonymous, wrote that my comment was “a bit rich – it’s harking back to classic anti-semitic stereotypes.” I responded: “I admit I’m at a loss to understand the anti-semitic charge. Is it the use of the ‘Zionist’ lobby? After all, there are Zionist Federations everywhere. Or is it the suggestion that this lobby controls politics and silences the media on the Israel issue? I’d really appreciate your advice on this – it seemed so uncontroversial when I wrote it – I suppose because I mix largely with left wing Jewish Australians. Is there another form of words which won’t offend people but makes the same point?”

He replied: “It’s the second suggestion: that Zionist groups control politics and the media i.e. that they are lumped into one intangible network, with a power so great that it is by nature malignant. By analogy, it’s akin to lumping all muslims into one one umbrella, and assigning to all muslims the aims and activities of just some. I also think using the adjective ‘fundamentalist’ is not quite right. It implies a religious fundamentalism and the religious intolerance (no brooking of difference in values) that goes with that. I suspect you were alluding to the political intolerance (ie no brooking of dissent). There’s a difference.”

I still couldn’t quite work it out, because “Fundamentalist Zionism” was not a description of all Jewish people, but of some Jewish and some fundamentalist Christian people in a political movement which support the actions of Sharon and his Likud party without question. In that regard, on the recommendation of a reader I read Israel’s apartheid: roots in ‘Revisionist Zionism’ (July 23). It reads:

When Ariel Sharon became Prime Minister of Israel, the picture on the wall was not that of Theodore Herzl, the secular and worldly European Jewish journalist whose book ‘The Jewish State’ launched the movement to create a modern-day nation-state tied to historical Judaism. Rather the picture on the wall was that of Vladimir Jabotinsky, the Jewish militant who was for many years the arch-nemesis of the Zionist establishment led by David Ben-Gurion and the Labor Party.

Jabotinsky was in fact declared a fascist by his opponents for espousing what today can be easily recognized as a kind of racist ‘ethnic-cleansing’ philosophy. He was so controversial that the leaders of Israel refused to even let him be buried in the Jewish State until the late 1970s after the first victory of his followers when Manachem Begin became Prime Minister.

In 1923, a generation after Herzl wrote ‘The Jewish State’, Jabotinsky wrote ‘The Iron Wall’. The roots of what has become Israeli Apartheid and now the widely-condemned nearly 500 kilometer long “Wall” are in this approach to the Palestinians long known as “Revisionism Zionism” and long the underlying philosophy of those who today rule Israel and attempt to speak for American Jewry. This telling excerpt from Jabotinsky’s ‘The Iron Wall’:

“There can be no discussion of voluntary reconciliation between us and the Arabs, not now, and not in the foreseeable future. All well-meaning people, with the exception of those blind from birth, understood long ago the complete impossibility of arriving at a voluntary agreement with the Arabs of Palestine for the transformation of Palestine from an Arab country to a country with a Jewish majority. Each of you has some general understanding of the history of colonization. Try to find even one example when the colonization of a country took place with the agreement of the native population. Such an event has never occurred.

The natives will always struggle obstinately against the colonists – and it is all the same whether they are cultured or uncultured. The comrades in arms of [Hernan] Cortez or [Francisco] Pizarro conducted themselves like brigands. The Redskins fought with uncompromising fervor against both evil and good-hearted colonizers. The natives struggled because any kind of colonization anywhere at anytime is inadmissible to any native people.

Any native people view their country as their national home, of which they will be complete masters. They will never voluntarily allow a new master. So it is for the Arabs. Compromisers among us try to convince us that the Arabs are some kind of fools who can be tricked with hidden formulations of our basic goals. I flatly refuse to accept this view of the Palestinian Arabs.

They have the precise psychology that we have. They look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux upon his prairie. Each people will struggle against colonizers until the last spark of hope that they can avoid the dangers of conquest and colonization is extinguished. The Palestinians will struggle in this way until there is hardly a spark of hope.

It matters not what kind of words we use to explain our colonization. Colonization has its own integral and inescapable meaning understood by every Jew and by every Arab. Colonization has only one goal. This is in the nature of things. To change that nature is impossible. It has been necessary to carry on colonization against the will of the Palestinian Arabs and the same condition exists now.

Even an agreement with non-Palestinians represents the same kind of fantasy. In order for Arab nationalists of Baghdad and Mecca and Damascus to agree to pay so serious a price they would have to refuse to maintain the Arab character of Palestine.

We cannot give any compensation for Palestine, neither to the Palestinians nor to other Arabs. Therefore, a voluntary agreement is inconceivable. All colonization, even the most restricted, must continue in defiance of the will of the native population. Therefore, it can continue and develop only under the shield of force which comprises an Iron Wall through which the local population can never break through. This is our Arab policy. To formulate it any other way would be hypocrisy.”

***

This was the sense in which I used the phrase “Fundamentalist Zionism”. Could a reader advise another form of words to describe this subset of Zionism which does not offend? As to my belief that powerful members of this subset control politics and the media, I thought this was stating a fact (see, for example, Shifting sands and awakening public and Senator Hollings Is Right: it’s all about Israel). I thought it was well known that in the US no politician wanting re-election would speak out about the excesses of current Israeli policy. I thought the relentless intimidation of the media by Australia’s AIJAC was commonly accepted. Clearly neither of these suppositions were true. My apologies.

I also asked Jenny Green, a long time Webdiarist and Jewish Australian, to help me understand where I went wrong. She replied:

“A nasty one. I clocked that when I read Webdiary last week and thought “Oh no, she’s going to get yelled at….”. I don’t believe or support some of the stuff I’m about to say, I’m just going to try to explain it.

No, it’s not anti-semitic, but I may be saying that because I know exactly what you’re referring to by the fundamentalist Zionist lobby. I think it could all be cleared up by defining the terms in which you’re talking – for instance, the fundamentalist Zionist lobby (at least in the US) is not exclusively Jewish, but also comprises many scary Christians, who believe (for various reasons) that the establishment of the state of Israel is necessary for the second coming. (No, I’m not joking! And there are LOTS of them.) Israelis are a bit divided on this issue – some of them welcome the support, while most of them deeply mistrust it.

It may also help if you define why Zionist is not synonymous with Jew. It may also help if you spell out that not all Jews have the financial clout and political power you write of. I know this must feel a little precious, but I can explain – a bit – why comments such as this get are getting an increasingly strong reaction.

Many Jews – ordinary, Australian, often non-practising, non-political, non-shul attending Jews – feel that when Palestinians or Palestinian supporting groups make a public “complaint” about the whole debacle, their complaints are welcomed, published and supported – but when Jews, or Jewish-supporting groups complain about – SPECIFICALLY – suicide bombers, they are told that because they are members of a wealthy, influential zionist lobby they have no right to complain. This often feels close to the sort of all “all Jews have lots of money and are secretly trying to take over the world” scenario which has been all too familiar.

This feeds right into the other biggest fear – that by refusing to explicitly condemn suicide bombing, the old attitude of a Jew’s death being worth nothing is on the rise again. And the fact – which I noticed especially during the Ashrawi debate – that the description “Jew” is being used more and more often doesn’t help. You have to remember that that label has variously been a source of shame and fear and danger within the lifetime of my own grandparents.

Not all Jews are Zionists. Not all Jews are rich. Not all Jews have political clout. If fact, most do not. And the interests of all Jews are not covered by the activities of those Jews who DO have money and political power. So when my cousin gets killed in a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv and I demand some action to prevent this happening, and Ariel Sharon decides that that action will take the form of a wall (which I personally think is discraceful), I get really angry when “you” tell me that instead of taking action to stop my other loved ones being killed, I have to right to self defence because I have the money and standing to get whet I want anyway.

I’m not saying that you specifically are trying to do this, but do you get what I mean? Just define your terms. Even during the Ashrawi debate, some definition would have prevented much of the angst amd anger of some of the responses. I remember noticing that several people who took offence at some of the responses were actually saying the same thing but had just misunderstood each other.

By the way, I’m half Jewish and half Irish – not only do I have terrorists on both sides of the family, but if there is a book of Guilt then honey, I wrote it!

***

To conclude, I sincerely apologise for any offence caused, and will be happy to publish reader discussion on the matter. The latest outbreak of hostilities is the decision by the Presbyterian Church in the US to consider divesting its assets in Israel: see haaretz.

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READERS ON THE WALL, AND ITS SUPPORTERS

A long time journalist who closely watches Middle East Politics

One thing that is such a telltale about Downer’s recent closeness to the Jewish right is his continued use of the expresion “suicide-homicide bomber”. There’s inherently nothing with it per se apart from the simple clumsiness of the expression, but the phrase has history. It was in the very far right in Israel and the US that the push came for this expression a couple of years ago, the argument being that even the expresion suicide bomber was unfair to Israel because it promoted the martyr and left out the victim. Totally one-eyed media watch groups like the hideoushonestreporting pushed its use as a matter of urgency, suggesting the use of “suicide bomber” was tantamount to supporting the act! Whatever the rather spurious merits of that argument, the expression became a real identifier of people from the “Israel right or wrong” side of politics.

So just watch how Downer is so absolutely careful to never use the expression “suicide bomber”, flagging his support behind – well behind Likud I guess.

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Grant Bar

You seem to think that Moir’s cartoon of 23/7 sums up the situation in the Middle East. Hardly surprising as you both seem to only be aware of (or pay attention to) the facts that support the conclusion that you have already reached – that is, Israel is bad and can do no right and the Palestinians are all peace loving people who, if given “back” the West Bank and Gaza would happily live in peace with Israel. Would that were true. Please find below the complete text of my letter to the editor regarding Moir’s cartoon:

Moir’s cartoon in today’s SMH demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of the Arab/Israeli conflict (or a deliberate attempt to ignore the facts). Israel was attacked in 1967 and in this defensive war captured the Gaza Strip from Egypt and the West Bank from Jordan (neither of whom created a Palestinian state when they occupied these lands).

UN Resolution 242 called for an exchange of “land for peace”. Israel has subsequently signed such peace agreements with these countries and they reclaimed all the land that they wanted. Neither wanted to take back control of the West Bank or Gaza even to immediately create a Palestinian state within these territories as it suited them to keep a thorn in Israel’s side.

These lands are now disputed territories. Israel offered Arafat 97% of this land in exchange for peace (with a territory exchanges to compensate for the 3%) in 2000. Arafat refused outright and unleashed a storm of terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians.

Israel is building a barrier to protect her citizens. When the Palestinian leadership is prepared to make peace a barrier can be moved but those murdered by terrorist bombs cannot be brought back to life.”

I am sure that the Palestinian people are suffering and I have sympathy for them but their suffering is as a direct result of the policies of their leaders. To focus on their suffering exclusively without putting this into the context of the Israeli suffering under constant terrorist attacks and the numerous attempts by Israel to make peace which have been spurned by the Palestinian leadership is to only consider part of the picture.

Australia’s vote against the International Court of Justice’s ruling on the barrier was a vote in recognition of a country’s right to defend herself against terrorism. The question is not why Australia voted against the UN resolution, but why more countries did not do the same.

***

Allen Jay

First congratulations on the book – I bought it on release at Brisbane airport and read it on the way to Manila. Yes, we have to get rid of John but will Mark be radical enough to wind back all the damage? Bob Brown seems the only small light in a Dark Night.

Anyway onto the latest digusting bit – the pro Israel vote in the general assembly and Alexanders disgusting defense of it. He really is a pathetic excuse for a man – mind you Little John is not much better – and these are our representatives to the world, representing the ANZAC spirit?! God help us all.

This really is the rabid right wing Zioinists leading the US and Australia meekly tagging behind – this is like a mirror image of the NAZI plan, which given Lenni Brenner’s investigations into the early history of the Zionist leadership is not surprising. When Sharon come to power on the back of the assassination of a PM who made peace with the Palestinians promising to destroy that peace, should anyone be suprised at what he has been prepared to do to achieve that end?

I know Anthony Loewenstein would not agree and is sensitive to the comparison, but, how else can it but be compared in all its ruthlessness, illegality and arrogance to the master race in replay (see Rubenstein strikes again: Now Howard’s a champion of human rights!).

The real problem for all of us is to stop this nonsense before it really does come back to destroy us as well as the people we have already destroyed in Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq.

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Andrew Price in Singapore

Good luck with going solo, I did it five years ago and have not looked back. I have lived in Singapore for 10 years but still logon to the SMH and Webdiary regularly. I thought you may be interested in my correspondence to the Australian High Commissioner in Singapore about this week’s vote against the UN resolution calling on Israel to dismantle its wall. As a Muslim convert, I wonder whether the Australian government has gone completely AWOL on its recent foreign policy decisions. It is hard to imagine any justification that could be given for the current route and location for this wall other than even more injustice for the Palestinians. Maybe that is why the Government voted against the UN resolution.

From: Andrew Price, July 21

To: Gary.Quinlan@dfat.gov.au

Subject: Terrorism White Paper

Gary,

I received the White Paper today, thank you very much.

It is impressive in its research on the problem of extremism and the ideology behind the “Al Qaida” way of thinking. It was good to read in there that Australia understands well and appreciates the difference between the ideology of the terrorists and mainstream Islam, especially in SE Asia.

But on a separate note I was shocked to read that Australia was one of a handful of countries that voted yesterday against the UN General Assembly resolution to press Israel to remove its illegal wall.

It is hard to imagine how any justification could be given for Australia’s decision which of course will be viewed extremely badly in the entire Islamic world. To me, there is no greater injustice than that faced by the Palestinians living under an illegal occupation for nearly 40 years.

While Israel’s right to defend itself against terrorists is understandable, the big problem is the location of the wall, not the wall itself. If the wall was located along the so-called green line, there would be no cause for complaint. However, its present location is clearly designed to make life impossible for even more Palestinians and to put more pressure on them to leave and to assume even more of their land.

How is it possible for Australia to ignore the findings of the International Court of Justice about the illegality of Israel’s plans? The resolution calls on Israel to comply with the International Court of Justice’s advisory opinion issued July 9 and tear down the barrier. It even included a requirement on the Palestinian Authority to “undertake visible efforts on the ground to arrest, disrupt and restrain individuals and groups conducting and planning violent attacks”.

Australia’s one-sided support for Israel is becoming as absurd as the position of the United States itself.

Surely resolving the Israel/Palestine dispute must be one of the best ways of reducing the threat of global terrorism. I notice that the White Paper does not even mention the importance of this dispute to the level of frustration and embitterment felt by so many Muslims and others about the injustice suffered by the Palestinians. But to ignore this factor in order not to be seen as rewarding terrorists is a grave mistake, in my opinion.

I am at a loss to explain to my friends the logic of recent Australian foreign policy decisions.

Antony Loewenstein writes the Engineering Consent column on the workings of the media.

“The promise that democracy would spread from a liberated Iraq, for example, was as poorly scrutinised [by the media] as the notion advanced by the administration that the Geneva conventions did not apply to the war on terror.” Moises Naim, The Financial Times, June 1, 2004

“Never underestimate the power of ideology and myth – in this case anti-Americanism – to trump reality. But at least we now know for sure it is not love, but being a left-wing intellectual, that means never having to say you’re sorry.” The Australian, 12 April 2004

The New York Times released an unprecedented statement on May 26. Though buried on page A10, the paper announced that in the run-up to the Iraq war, “we have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been.” This was the understatement of the year, even from a paper as prone to making grand statements of unsubstantiated fact regarding Iraq’s WMD and links to Islamic terrorism.

My earlier report, The New York Times‘ role in promoting war in Iraq, outlined the ways in which its star reporter, Judith Miller, produced numerous page one stories painting a doomsday prediction of Saddam’s biological, chemical and nuclear arsenal. Frequently written without caveats or even mild qualifications, it has since emerged that the vast majority of her scoops were gleaned from Ahmad Chalabi, recently described by, of all people, L. Marc Zell, former law partner of Douglas Feith, current Undersecretary of Defence, as “a treacherous, spineless turncoat.”

Chalabi was also feted and supported financially by many of the neo-conservative ideologues in Washington’s power-elite such as Vice-President Dick Cheney and Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz. Since the early 1990s, Chalabi’s INC (Iraqi National Congress) gathered friends, confidantes and generous benefactors to support the overthrow of Saddam’s regime. Problem is, Chalabi is now under suspicion of sharing American secrets with the Iranian theocracy and hoodwinking, on a scale virtually unprecedented, many of the main players behind the Bush administration’s push towards the illegal Iraqi invasion.

The role of The Australian newspaper in pushing the war agenda was essential. Like every other Murdoch newspaper around the world, dutifully pushing their master’s wishes, the mogul said in early 2003: “We can’t back down now, where you hand over the whole of the Middle East to Saddam…. I think Bush is acting very morally, very correctly, and I think he is going to go on with it.” Putting to one side the factual inaccuracy of his statement (Saddam has held little strategic influence over the Middle East for at least a decade), Murdoch’s pro-war and pro-business agenda was mirrored in The Australian‘s coverage. Apart from bullying and foreboding editorials regarding Iraq’s supposed WMD, Foreign Editor Greg Sheridan deserves special mention for hyping up Iraq’s supposed threat. No other Australian journalist produced more fawning attention to the claims churned out by Bush, Blair and Howard, though stable-mate Paul Kelly was also competitive. Virtually all of his claims have subsequently been proven false and yet no apology has been forthcoming. Likewise from the paper’s editorial staff. This kind of short-term memory loss journalism is undermining the public’s trust in the media’s ability to report accurately and transparently. This behaviour should not be considered responsible reporting – it is nothing more than lies and arrogance dressed up in sanctimonious chest beating.

The Times May 26 statement made no mention of Judith Miller. Indeed, the paper congratulated itself first (“we found an enormous amount of journalism that we are proud of”) before discussing past mistakes. Focusing on journalist’s reliance on Iraqi informants, defectors and exiles committed on “regime change”, the publication admitted it had frequently run claims as fact. “Administration officials now acknowledge that they sometimes fell for misinformation from these exile sources”, the Times wrote. “Articles based on dire claims about Iraq tended to get prominent display, while follow-up articles that called the original ones into question were sometimes buried. In some cases, there was no follow-up at all.”

One of the more incendiary claims before the war was Iraq’s supposed use of aluminium tubing for the manufacture of nuclear weapons fuel. The Times reported these accusations as close to fact in late 2002, while in reality the evidence was far less convincing. The paper’s mea culpa accepted that they should have been vigilant in reporting the use of the tubes. “Five days later [after September 8, 2002], the Times reporters learned that the tubes were in fact a subject of debate among intelligence agencies. The misgivings appeared deep in an article on Page A13, under a headline that gave no inkling that we were revising our earlier view (‘White House Lists Iraq Steps to Build Banned Weapons’)”. Once again, government voices were given prominence over the more sceptical view. It was a sin committed time and time again from late 2001 to mid 2003 in relation to WMD.

On April 21, 2003, while embedded with the 101st Airborne Division, south of Baghdad, Miller reported an Iraqi scientist who claimed that Saddam had destroyed chemical and biological weapons only days before the war had begun. It was yet another Miller “exclusive” and faithfully placed prominently. No weapons were ever found and amazingly, in an act of faith the Times must surely be regretting, she accepted the military’s rules of engagement: “this reporter was not permitted to interview the scientist or visit his home. Nor was she permitted to write about the discovery of the scientist for three days, and the copy was then submitted for a check by military officials.” Hardly fearless reporting by the world’s supposedly finest publication.

A few days before the Times printed its mea culpa, a memo was sent to staff explaining the rationale. Executive Editor Bill Keller and Managing Editor Jill Abramson claimed the note was “not an attempt to find a scapegoat or to blame reporters for not knowing then what we know now. Nor is it intended to signal that you should pull your punches. Quite the contrary. As you have probably noticed in, for example, our coverage of the prisoner abuse story, we prize hard-won, hard-hitting stories … For those of you who are wondering about the next chapter of this ordeal, the next chapter is, we keep reporting.”

After publication of the note, more than 300 newspapers in the US, and countless around the world, were faced with the task of reviewing their own methods. On May 27, The Sydney Morning Herald published a piece from The Washington Post and attached an acknowledgement that the paper had published “three of the problematic stories.” There was no follow-up or investigation of the unprecedented Times move. Alarmingly, the only Fairfax publication to seriously address this scandal was The Financial Review. (On May 28, Tony Walker examined the fall-out of the editor’s note and quoted Slate columnist Jack Shafer: “The true test of the Times is on the horizon: having promised to set the record straight on the Iraq WMD story, what sort of journalism will the newspaper commit?”)

In the US, many papers printed elements of the Times apology. The most telling response, however, came from Doug Clifton, editor of The Plain Dealer in Cleveland. His paper ran the editor’s note on page two but questioned the Times alerting his paper at 10pm the night before. “A correction ought not to be one of those things you have to deal with as breaking news”, Clifton said. “They knew about this for a while. It is sort of bothersome that they did not put any advisories out.” It can be persuasively argued that The New York Times wasn’t too keen on making its wide readership aware of past transgressions.

Other editors across America raised the more fundamental questions over the editor’s note, from the use of unnamed sources to editorial controls over content. Clifton compared the event with the Jayson Blair scandal, though arguing, “it’s worse because it speaks to the essence of the reporting and editing process. That is worse than one guy screwing around and playing fast and loose.”

If there was ever doubt over Times support for Judith Miller, her by-line reappeared in early June. The story examined the role of the UN in the oil-for-food program. Astoundingly, Chalabi featured – proudly defended by an Iraqi National Congress official. Greg Mitchell from Editor & Publisher wrote on June 2 that “nowhere in the story is there any relevance to Chalabi’s track record with Miller or the Times, or its stunning downfall last week. More irony: the Miller story (co-written by Warren Hoge) appeared on the same day the Times, on its front page, strongly suggested that Chalabi had passed vital US secrets to the Iranians. Yet more irony: right next to the new Miller story was a lengthy article titled, ‘Powell Presses CIA on Faulty Intelligence on Iraq Arms.’ You can’t make this stuff up. (Well, come to think of it, maybe you can.)”

The establishment last December of the Times Public Editor, Daniel Okrent, was a welcome sign of further accountability. On May 30, Okrent went further than the editor’s note and more fully explained the ways in which the newspaper printed numerous false stories on Iraq’s WMD. Though beginning with the clear statement of “I think they got it right. Mostly”, he soon admits fundamental flaws in the paper’s editorial guidelines. After speaking to numerous reporters and editors related to the WMD story, he is convinced that “a dysfunctional system enabled some reporters operating out of Washington and Baghdad to work outside the lines of customary bureau management. In some instances, reporters who raised substantive questions about certain stories were not heeded. Worse, some with substantial knowledge of the subject at hand seem not to have been given the chance to express reservations.”

It is a strong statement and admirable. It is certainly the most transparent admission of any newspaper on this matter. The fact that it doesn’t go nearly far enough is also relevant and the fact that the note is only online and unlikely to be read by vast amounts of people is equally worrying. It’s an encouraging start, however, and will hopefully lead to deeper examination of how one of the world’s major papers became the Bush administration’s ideal conduit for outrageous, dishonest and false accusations. Strong supporters of media accountability should be supporting similar institutions here. Perhaps The Sydney Morning Herald is having similar thoughts.

Michael Massing commented in The New York Review of Books on June 24 that the Times mea culpa was a welcome sign but “for months, the Times has seemed slow to recognise important news developments out of Iraq and to give them the attention they deserve. Aside from the Abu Ghraib scandal, which has largely taken over the Times coverage, the paper has seemed intent on keeping bad news off the front page.” Furthermore, Massing offers advice for a Western media increasingly behind in its coverage and scope:

“If US news organizations truly wanted to get inside events in Iraq, there’s a clear step they could take: incorporating more reporting and footage from international news organizations. Al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya, and other Arabic-language TV stations have a wide presence on the ground. European outlets like the BBC, the Guardian and Le Monde have Arabic-speaking correspondents with close knowledge of the Middle East…. It’s remarkable how little reporting from these organizations makes it way into American news accounts.”

So what of the Times international reputation? The Guardian on May 29 was scathing. Aside from chiding editorial and Judith Miller herself for blindness towards the deceit Chalabi, journalist James Moore uncovered some rudimentary facts about Miller’s political background and allegiances:

“The Middle East Forum, an organisation that openly advocated that the US overthrow Saddam, listed Miller as an expert speaker on its website and held a launch party for her book. She was represented by Benador Associates, a speakers’ bureau that specialises in conservative thinkers with Middle East expertise. I asked Miller if she supported Bush politically. ‘My views are well known,’ she replied. ‘I understood that these people who hated us so much … that if they ever got their hands on WMD, they would use them. Do I have a belief that the WMD exist, and a fear? Yeah, I have real fear for my country.’

Nobody wanted a war against Iraq more than Ahmad Chalabi, and the biggest paper in the US gave it to him almost as willingly as the White House did.”

(One of the most detailed and devastating examinations of Miller’s background, experience and personal allegiances is by Franklin Foer of June’s New York Metro.

A strong condemnation of the Times came from US-based progressive website, Buzzflash. Demanding nothing less than regime change at the newspaper (due in no small part to its lack of personnel changes), the editorial chastises the myths around which the paper operates:

“Make no mistake about it; the NYT tries to continue to appear to be a liberal newspaper in its news coverage. It tends to take a secular perspective on choice, race, and gender issues, for instance. But being ‘modern’ and ‘urban’ has not precluded the NYT from being, in general, insidiously pro-Republican and anti-Democratic Party in its presidential news coverage, whatever specific exceptions it can offer to the contrary.”

Furthermore, it argued that the “gray lady” needs journalists and editors who would “re-institute the tradition of investigative reporting that uncovers the wrongs done by political figures that violate the public trust. It needs regime change to meet White House pronouncements with skepticism, instead of plastering them on the front page with several column headlines.” Much of their suggestions equally apply to Australia’s broadsheets. Despite an ever-increasing quotient of lies emanating from John Howard’s ministers, it continues printing Government statements as fact, until proven otherwise. Reactive, not proactive journalism is the death of accountable media. When was the last night a mainstream newspaper clearly and confidently accused a major public figure of lying and then stuck with the story for weeks, keeping the pressure on daily? As famed journalist Phillip Knightley recently said: “There are a lot of stories in Australia which start with a big bang, then exposure, then inequity. Newspapers lose interest. I think readers care. You can make the readers care.”

Buzzflash puts it best: “May the [Times] return to its role, in its new section, as a voice for democracy, the engagement of public political debate, uncoverer of corruption, investigative journalism and seeker of truth and justice…. Judith Miller should go, but so should all the individuals responsible for a ‘corporate culture’ at The New York Times that has failed democracy.”

Alexander Cockburn of Counterpunch, a long-time critic of the Times, argued on May 28 that the paper’s mea culpa was nothing more than an avoidance of the real issues. His argument goes to the heart of the journalistic profession:

“This brings us to the now popular scapegoat for the fictions about WMDs, touted by Timeseditors, by other reporters and by US intelligence agencies. It was all the fault of the smooth-tongued Ahmed Chalabi, now fallen from grace and stigmatized as a cat’s-paw of Iranian intelligence. But was there ever a moment when Chalabi’s motives and the defectors he efficiently mass-produced should not have been questioned by experienced reporters, editors and intelligence analysts?”

Cockburn articulates a necessary malaise within mainstream journalism. Noam Chomsky calls itManufacturing Consent. He writes that the mass media “serves to mobilize support for the special interests that dominate the state and private activity and that their choices, emphases, and omissions can often be understood best, and sometimes with striking clarity and insight, by analyzing them in such terms. Perhaps this is an obvious point, but the democratic postulate is that the media are independent and committed to discovering and reporting the truth, and that they do not merely reflect the world as powerful groups wish to perceive it.” The New York Times is exactly the kind of newspaper Chomsky argues is incapable of seeing its inherent biases and slavish love of power. The newspaper’s virtually unqualified reporting of Bush administration lies over Iraq is ample evidence of this thesis.

The Sydney Morning Herald editorialised on 19 March 2003 that Australia should not enter the impending Iraq conflict. “It should not have come to this”, it stated. “The international community should not have failed to disarm Iraq peacefully. The United Nations Security Council should not have failed so spectacularly (ed: blindly authorising American demands and militarism?). The United States and Britain should not have been left to go it alone (ed: to invade a country illegally and with no weapons threatening the region or the world?) And when the moment of truth arrived, Australia should not have been so deeply committed to a course set by the US and Britain that it had no choice. We could only confirm the already promised support and are now in a deeply regrettable war.” The best that can be said for its stand was the call for calm – and no war.

By November 4, the Herald expressed its concerns about the lack of WMD, but along with the majority of Western media, still held Bush administration claims for Iraq as believable and achievable: “The US has not wavered from its commitment to see Iraq rebuilt and power transferred to a stable democratic government”, it offered. The facts overwhelm that the US has never wanted a real democracy in the Middle East, despite the vast rhetoric, but rather a manageable dictator or strongman to control the country’s oil reserves and the continual presence of US forces. It appears inconceivable to the Herald that the US government’s aims for Iraq should be questioned. After the lies of Iraq’s non-existent WMD and links to al-Qaeda, why do Leader writers continue accepting Western governments’ comments as essentially decent and good? As Medialens (www.medialens.org) offered after the passing of Ronald Reagan on June 10:

“Thus, last year, it rapidly became understood in the media that it was wrong to continue challenging the Iraq war once the shooting had started. The invasion had become no less immoral, illegal or murderous when it was actually being fought, but we owed it to ‘our boys’ – risking life and limb in service to our country – to ‘back them’. All challenges to this argument were dismissed out of hand – the idea that we could best protest ‘our boys’ by bringing them home, for example, was considered mere sophistry.”

Once again, on March 19, the Herald continued the idea that Iraq may become a democracy in the heart of the Middle East – exactly echoing the propaganda of Bush, Blair and Howard. As the three leaders’ spin shifted from WMD and al-Qaeda to Iraqi ‘democracy’, so did the mainstream press. “One year on, the justification for the war is not the justification for starting it. Instead it is the hope that by toppling Saddam, Iraq might become a template for a new, stable Middle East.” The evidence against this is profound, from polls conducted in the region to US Army Generals toaverage Iraqis themselves. And yet newspapers still prefer to live in a reality created for them by their government “masters”.

Greg Sheridan is The Australian‘s Foreign Editor and is well versed in swallowing and propagating government spin. He is notorious as an apologist for the former Indonesian regime of Suharto, once mocking an Australian parliamentary study that revealed over 200,00 people had been killed during the dictator’s reign. His performance, and that of his Murdoch cheer-leading paper, both during the run-up to the Iraq conflict, and increasingly since, has been nothing less than a continual shifting of the goal posts of responsibility and truth.

As early at late September 2002, Sheridan was already building the case for war against Saddam. After the release of the now infamous dossier by Tony Blair’s Government, Sheridan wrote the following: “[the dossier] goes some way to nailing the preposterous idea that there is a lack of evidence that Saddam Hussein has and is pursuing weapons of mass destruction.” He soon breathlessly mentioned the absurd 45-minute claim (that Saddam could deploy chemical and biological weapons in less than one hour) and Saddam’s attempts to obtain uranium from Niger (subsequently proven false by the Bush administration itself). This dossier has since been proven untrue and yet there has been no apology or acknowledgement by Sheridan of his grievous error.

By early 2003, Sheridan was content to quote Henry Kissinger, former US secretary of state and official apologist for mass murder and Third-World dictatorships. (Christopher Hitchens has been one of the most eloquent accusers against the former government chameleon.) Sheridan wrote as if he and Kissinger were best of friends (“All his discussions were off the record, including with me, so I can’t tell you exactly what he said”) and then explained the reasons that we should listen to a man who co-ordinated the overthrow of the democratally elected government of Chile in 1973 and the carpet bombing of Cambodia in the early 1970s, among a host of other war crimes. “Kissinger’s judgement”, gushed Sheridan, “that this action [to invade Iraq] is necessary and is being carried out by one of the most formidable national security teams ever assembled in Washington – is surely right.” The question remains: what does a person need to do before Sheridan deems him too corrupted by power, and is Mugabe and Milosovic next on his interview wish list?

By the middle of 2003, and with a glaring lack of WMD, Sheridan’s allies were looking shaky. On 12 July, The Australian ran a story on Page 1 claiming “soldiers have found what the US believes is proof of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction program”. (Note the shift from “weapons” to “programs”.) Only by turning to Page 11 were readers illuminated by this bold claim. Sheridan had interviewed John Bolton, the US Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and Security. Though described as a non neo-conservative by Sheridan, Bolton was indeed one of the main players behind the rush to war. And once again, outrageously optimistic statements were made without qualification or hesitation: “The evidence that Hussein had WMD programs is so overwhelming, he [Bolton] can barely understand how it is doubted.” The world is still waiting to be stunned by Bolton’s “overwhelming” evidence.

15 December 2003 brought the first sign of major triumpantalism by Sheridan, with the capture of Saddam. His analysis, however, has proven to be spectacularly inaccurate and culturally insensitive. With statements such as these: “Axis of evil dictators should know this is the end point of the defiance of US power” and “Arab culture universally respects power and the effective disposition of force”, we are faced with an Orientalism of the most racist kind. “This must be a massive boost for George W. Bush domestically”, offered Sheridan. “Nothing succeeds like success and it will be very hard for his opponents to deny this success to Bush and his policy. All politics are temporary, but this is a great day for the good guys everywhere.” Looks like he wasn’t reading the early reports of prisoner abuse, murder and exploitation in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay.

By early 2004, even Sheridan seemed perturbed about the lack of WMD. However, rather than seeking out the voices of intelligence figures who were critiquing Bush administration claims, he spoke to two veterans of Israeli intelligence, one of whom had actually worked with the Bush administration. Sheridan found it incomprehensible that the “Coalition of the Willing” had lied and greatly exaggerated Iraq’s threat level for political and strategic reasons. He was therefore doing his best, in regular Thursday columns, to cushion the blow for Western governments caught twisting the truth. One could not find a finer apologist for Western crimes. As Scott Burchill, lecturer in international relations at Deakin University, wrote on 1 March 2004, the WMD cheerleaders in the media “remain utterly shameless about their conduct.”

Murdoch’s Australian has been the key propaganda arm in the country. One editorial after another has trumpeted the rightness of the “Coalition’s” mission in Iraq. In late January last year, the paper was already proving its pro-Bush/Blair/Howard stance. “We are not at war, but we have signaled to the international community, and Iraq, that Australia rejects the route of appeasement. As an open democracy and a strong but not unthinking ally of the US, the difficult course we have taken provides leadership towards a peaceful world and is in the nation’s interests.” This is but one of the paper’s truly Orwellian statements – peace is war and war is peace. And nowhere does Murdoch’s mouthpiece (with a fundamental belief that war is good for business) outline where Australia has actually questioned Bush administration policy. Guantanamo Bay? Prisoner abuse accusations in Afghanistan? Government sanctioned torture at US military facilities? Only three examples the Howard Government surely knew about.

In the light of Reagan’s recent death and the mainstream media’s virtual whitewashing of his true legacy (perhaps expressed best by incendiary journalist, Greg Palast, the Australian‘s Leader on 31 January 2003 is worth repeating. After Bush’s speech to the UN, the paper said: “Far from looking stupid, Mr. Bush nowadays has an almost Reaganite ease of communication. Both the style of substance of his address gave weight to the emerging view that in some respects the Bush presidency represents ‘Reagan’s third term’, and has the potential to transform the international scene by its unambiguous adherence to ‘simplistic’ principles of freedom and decency.” As ever, the corruption, conflicts of interest and untruths displayed by our leaders are minor facts to be wished away by talking about “asserting the claims of peace and security over the threat of chaos.”

Saddam’s link to Islamist terrorism was one of the main tenets for pro-war supporters. The Bush administration constantly suggested links to al-Qaeda and 9-11 and The Australian was more than happy to shadow the accusations. “The Iraq dictator’s links with international terrorism cannot be dismissed as fantasy”, claimed the paper on 5 February. “The example an unrepentant and triumphant Hussein would set to regimes like North Korea is not an option to embrace.” The only credible evidence linking Saddam to international terrorism was his supporting and funding of Palestinian families whose child had committed suicide bombing. This kind of action can hardly be compared to the actions of al-Qaeda or Jemaah Islamiah and is no threat to the safety of the world, aside from Israel.

By the end of February, the paper issued its most aggressive stance: “The day is rapidly approaching when opponents of military action to disarm Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship will have no choice but to either put up or shut up.” Mirroring Government spin on appeasement, Murdoch’s mouthpiece hammered the themes of getting tough and freeing the Iraqi people from tyranny. Unsurprisingly, and not unlike the Herald, the Australian stressed the inherent goodness of the Howard Government, struggling with massive decisions. And once again, the thought that Howard was joining the “Coalition” for less than freedom-loving reasons was unutterable.

Underlying the Australian‘s message was the “national interest.” Arguing that 9-11 had made the policy of containment no longer relevant, Australia had to act decisively to avoid the “nightmare scenario” – terrorists with WMD. One of the more telling examples of the paper’s hazy logic and lack of rigorous journalistic ethics was this statement on 14 March:

“While Mr. Howard did not adduce direct evidence of a connection between al-Qaeda and Iraq, he detailed the terrorists’ interest in acquiring weapons of mass destruction, and Iraq’s interests in aiding and abetting terrorism. The dots are there to be joined.”

Forget about watertight evidence. Forget about conclusive proof that Iraq is an imminent threat to the safety of the world. Politicians wanting to create in the public’s mind the impression that Saddam and Osama bin Laden are one and the same thing (a dangerous misnomer) was a disturbing confusion propagated by Murdoch’s broadsheet. (This fact has now been proven false again by the 9-11 Commission.

Once the bombs starting dropping on Iraq in late March 2003 (described in March 2004 as “a model of military art and … remarkable restraint”), the paper continued pushing the imminent-threat lie parroted by Howard, Bush and Blair. “While much more formidable than Iraq, Iran and North Korea do not pose the same kind of immediate threat … At least seven nations possess nuclear weapons, and an unknown number have biological and chemical weapons: ignoring Iraq would have encouraged proliferation.” The sheer hypocrisy of these statements is astounding. First, Israel as one of the world’s greatest proliferators is never mentioned. Second, America’s record of reducing its WMD stockpile is abysmal. Indeed, the Bush administration has frequently publicly expressed its desire to resume nuclear testing. In 2001, the US refused to enforce a protocol to ban biological weapons, saying that to do so would put at risk national security and confidential business information. (The New Nuclear Danger, Dr Helen Caldicott. Scribe Publications 2002)

By early 2004, and with no WMD, no proven links to international terrorism and a country increasingly unstable, the Australian explained the absence of weapons as thus: “It is easy to see how it happened. Over the years, United Nations weapon’s inspectors had found ample evidence of WMDs in Iraq, and as war approached Saddam offered no credible case that they have been destroyed. But the burden of proof to justify invading Iraq should have been higher than this.” This final qualification is all that exists of allocating blame. When in trouble, bash the UN. No acknowledgement that Bush, Blair and Howard criminally exaggerated intelligence. And most certainly no acceptance that the newspaper had played a vital part in going along with the Great Lie. “Never having to say you’re sorry” was the paper’s patronising critique of the Left on 12 April 2004. It’s time Murdoch’s lapdogs took some of their own advice.

The Herald‘s Paul McGeough explained in late June this year that the Australian Government (and by extension, the pro-war press) is avoiding the fundamental lessons of the Iraq war. By acknowledging nothing, denying everything and stonewalling every investigation, we are all therefore complicit in a war crime of unprecedented gravity:

“Early this year we had the Howard Government backslapping itself because its inquiry had found it had been ‘more moderate and more measured’ in its use of bogus intelligence as a reason for war. Now we have yesterday’s report clearing Australian troops in Iraq of allegations that were not made. If this is the sort of society the US – and Australia – has become, then let’s be honest about it.”

FURTHER READING

– The New Yorker‘s comprehensive critique of Ahmed Chalabi’s manipulation of the West:http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040607fa-fact1

– How The Washington Post and the Times “created” Chalabi:http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6245.htm

Thanks to Scott Burchill for assistance on this story.

aloewenstein@f2network.com.au

G’day Webdiarists. No Webdiary this week – I’m travelling and chatting on radio to launch my book, “Not happy John! Defending our democracy”. Here’s my current itinerary, subject to change. I hope I can meet some of you at the launches and that you can tune in to an interview. The launches are all free except Gleebooks in Sydney – $7 to hear my hero Tony Fitzgerald launch it. Please introduce yourself and I’ll refund the money. For the Canberra launch in Parliament House tomorrow (Monday) you’ll need someone to sign you into the place. Call me on 62404040 if you need help. Otherwise, there’s a local launch on Saturday in Kingston. The book is the result of four years of conversations we’ve had on Webdiary. Thank you to all those who’ve read Webdiary and contributed to it. The book’s website, nothappyjohn should be live late this week – we welcome corrections, new info, reader reviews and ideas to get together to take back OUR democracy.

 

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NOT HAPPY JOHN! DEFENDING OUR DEMOCRACY, Penguin, rrp $24.95, publication date 21 June 2004

MONDAY 21 June 2004, CANBERRA/SYDNEY

7.40am – RADIO 2CC Canberra, interviewer Mike Jeffreys, LIVE

9am – AUSTRALIAN JEWISH NEWS Newspaper, interviewer Peter Kohn

9.40am – STEREO 974 Melbourne, interviewer Bob Taylor, LIVE

10.20am – COMMERCIAL RADIO 2UE Sydney, interviewer George Moore, LIVE

10.40am – COMMERCIAL RADIO 2GB Sydney, interviewer Tim Webster, LIVE

Noon – NOT HAPPY, JOHN! LAUNCH by Julia Gillard MP, shadow Minister for Health and Manager of Opposition Business. Hosted by Senator Bob Brown, Australian Greens Senator for Tasmania. Senators Members and Guests Bar, 2nd Floor, Parliament House, Canberra.

4pm – 702 ABC RADIO Sydney, interviewer Richard Glover, LIVE

6.20pm – COMMERCIAL RADIO 4BC Brisbane, interviewer Tony Johnston, PRE RECORD

***

TUESDAY 22 June 2004, SYDNEY

10.10am EST, 9.40AM SA – RADIO 5DN Adelaide, interviewer Jeremy Cordeaux, LIVE

Noon EST, 11.30AM SA – 5UV RADIO Adelaide, interviewer Cath Keneally, PRE RECORD

12.30pm – BAY FM Byron Bay, interviewer Terrie Wells, PRE RECORD

12.45pm EST, 10.15 Perth – RADIO 6PR Perth, interviewers Mario Dorazio and Deb Kennedy, LIVE

5.30pm – ABC RADIO TRIPLE J Nationally, ‘Hack’, interviewer Steve Cannane, LIVE

5.45pm – 666 ABC RADIO Canberra, interviewer Ross Sully, LIVE

6.30pm – NOT HAPPY JOHN SYDNEY LAUNCH, GLEEBOOKS, to be launched by Tony Fitzgerald QC, 49 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe

10pm – ABC RADIO NATIONAL, interviewer Phillip Adams, LIVE

***

WEDNESDAY 23 June 2004, SYDNEY

10am – 936 ABC RADIO Hobart, interviewer Tim Cox, LIVE

11.30am EST, 11am NT – 105.7 ABC RADIO Darwin, interviewer Annie Gastin, LIVE

12.30pm – RADIO 927 Melbourne, interviewer Trevor Himstedt, PRE RECORD

***

THURSDAY 24 June 2004 MELBOURNE

7.45am – RADIO 3RRR Melbourne, interviewers Fee Badford-Braycher, Sam Pang and Tony Wilson, LIVE

10am – RADIO 3AW Melbourne, interviewer Ross Warnecke, LIVE

11.00am – 774 ABC RADIO Melbourne, interviewers Jon Faine and Terry Lane, LIVE

3.30pm – TIME OFF MAGAZINE Nationally, interviewer Matt Connors

4pm – BIG ISSUE Magazine Nationally, interviewer Jo Case

6.30pm – MELBOURNE LAUNCH, READINGS BOOKSHOP, 309 Lygon St, Carlton

***

FRIDAY 25 June 2004, BRISBANE

10.30am – 612 ABC RADIO Brisbane, interviewer Steve Austin, LIVE

11am – ABC RADIO NORTH WEST Queensland, interviewer Jemma Schweikert, LIVE

1.10pm EST, 11.10am Perth – 720 ABC RADIO Perth Chat Room Media Section, interviewer Jo McManus, LIVE

3pm – THE INDEPENDENT Street Press QLD, UTOPIA MAGAZINE Queeensland University of Technology, interviewer Tim Milfull, to run 8 July

6.30pm – BRISBANE LAUNCH, an AVID READER event at Kurilpa Hall, 174 Boundary Street, West End. Margo in Conversation with journo Wayne Sanderson
Contact: Fiona 07 3846 3422

***

SATURDAY 26 June 2004, CANBERRA

12.30pm – A SUITABLE BOOK Event, Shop 6, Kennedy St, Kingston. Contact Mark Thornton on 02 6239 7798

***

Saturday 3 July 2004, CANBERRA

12.30pm – A SUITABLE BOOK event, Village Square, Malbon St, Bungendore. Contact Mark Thornton on 02-62381648

***

To contact Penguin call 03-98112400.

Dr Scott Burchill is a lecturer in international relations at Deakin University and a regular Webdiary contributor.

 

(1) “It’s my view that Iraq is really irrelevant to the intent and the purposes of Al Qaeda. It may be something that is used for propaganda and recruitment purposes, and this is not only my view but it’s also the view of the Director General of ASIO Dennis Richardson. He gave voice to this view in a major speech he gave last year.” John Howard, 7.30 Report, ABC, 15 March 2004

(2) “But we also need to understand that this contest in Iraq represents a critical confrontation in the war against terror… I find it astonishing when people claim that Iraq is a diversion from the real war against terrorism. The reality is that international terrorism has invested an enormous amount in breaking the will of the coalition in Iraq. Not only are organisations associated with al Qaeda operating in Iraq but each and every turn of the Iraq struggle is interpreted by spokesmen for international terrorism as part of the ongoing campaign against the United States and her allies. Whatever may have been the origins of the horrific attack in Madrid, al Qaeda and its associates opportunistically associated that attack with Spain’s participation in the military operation in Iraq.” John Howard, Address to the Institute of Public Affairs,The Australian Club, Melbourne, 19 May 2004

(3) “I’ll be warning that a defeat for the coalition in Iraq will greatly hearten and embolden terrorists in our part of the world. What people have got to understand is that irrespective of the views about whether we should have gone there in the first place, terrorists see Iraq as the frontline in the international struggle against countries like Australia and our friends in our region and if the coalition fails in Iraq, if the terrorists win in Iraq, they will also win and organisations like Jemaah Islamiyah with all its reach in the Asian Pacific region will also win. A win for the terrorists in Iraq will embolden and lead to the recruitment of more terrorists in our part of the world.” John Howard Doorstop interview, Canberra, 18 June 2004

How do we explain the Prime Minister’s change of view? How did Iraq go from being “irrelevant to the intent and the purposes of Al Qaeda” in March to it being seen by terrorists “as the frontline in the international struggle against countries like Australia and our friends in our region” by June?

The answer is that in March, Howard was trying to undermine AFP Chief Mick Keelty’s unremarkable and obvious remarks that Australia’s participation in the Iraq war increased the threat of terrorism. So in March it was necessary to attack Keelty and defend the war in Iraq by separating it from the so called war on terror.

By June, however, all the pretexts for the war, including WMD and Saddam-Al Qaeda links, had long since collapsed and it was necessary to attack Mark Latham’s policy of returning home Australian soldiers in Iraq by Christmas. Suddenly, Iraq is central to the intent and purposes of Al Qaeda. In fact it has regional and global significance for the war on terror.

Who said Howard didn’t see international politics through a domestic prism?

This is yesterday’s reply by Labor Senate Leader John Faulkner to Robert Hill’s “statement” on Australia’s cover-up of the Abu Ghraib torture scandal.

 

This much-heralded statement, this comprehensive explanation promised two weeks ago by the Prime Minister, is a disgrace. It�s a damp squib. It�s not an explanation. It�s a whitewash.

The Government insists on responding to allegations that have not been made. The Opposition has not � does not � accuse Australian troops of having been involved in the abuse of prisoners. This is a straw man put up by the Government. After all it�s so much easier for Mr Howard and his colleagues to defend Australian troops against imagined slurs than to address the real and uncomfortable issues this saga has raised.

This so-called statement is just the last in a litany of failures for which Senator Hill must take ultimate responsibility.

What it reveals is a supine Government, a dysfunctional department and a Minister asleep at the wheel.

Senator Hill blames the Opposition � for indulging in smear tactics and claims of cover-up. He blames Defence � for providing inaccurate information to the Government. He blames everybody but himself.

This is a Minister more concerned about self-preservation than decent standards. His statement is full of excuses � there�s nothing about consequences.

And the logical consequence of a fiasco such as this is the big gap in Senator Hill�s statement � his own resignation.

This is the Minister who, 20 months ago, in the wake of the �children overboard� scandal, promised to fix the very problems which have caused this mess. He has failed abysmally.

The Prime Minister, the Minister for Defence and senior Defence officials seriously misled the Australian parliament and people about what the Government knew and when, in relation to the abuse of Coalition detainees in Iraq. And the only excuse Senator Hill can offer is �It was the best we knew at the time.� We hear today Senator Hill has apologised to the Prime Minister. What about apologising to the Parliament and the Australian people?

Remember that on 27 May in the House of Representatives, Mr Howard said it was not until February of this year that a report by the Red Cross raised allegations of ill treatment of detainees. An earlier report in October 2003 had covered only �general concerns about detainee conditions and treatment�. He went on to say: �To suggest that, because Major O�Kane drafted a response to the October report, he or the Australian government were in some way aware of the more serious allegations�.. is quite nonsensical.

In the Senate, Senator Hill told us on 11 May that Defence and the Government �became aware of the International Red Cross report in February�. When asked when he personally became aware of the prisoner abuse, he said �I am not going to split myself from the Government� and �I accept the responsibilities that flow from that.� I�ll come back to the issue of Senator Hill�s responsibility.

Persistent questioning by the media and the Opposition following the publication of the abuse photos at the end of April led Defence to conduct an inquiry � its first inquiry – into its state of knowledge of the abuses.

The results of that inquiry, which included a survey of 298 members of the Defence forces, were announced by the Chief of the Defence Force, General Cosgrove and the Secretary of Defence, Mr Ric Smith, on 28 May. We were informed that �none of those surveyed were aware of abuse or serious mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners or detainees, of the nature of recent allegations, during their deployment� and �there were no reports about the abuse or serious mistreatment of prisoners or detainees of the nature of recent allegations made, either through the chain of command or informally.�

General Cosgrove and Mr Smith informed us that Major O�Kane had said that �the October 2003 [Red Cross] report raised general concerns about detainee conditions and treatment, but no mention of abuse.� As for the top brass? �Neither the current Australian Joint Force Commander in the Middle East or any of his predecessors was aware of these allegations of abuse or serious mistreatment � until the publication of photographs in April 2004, and neither was Defence leadership in Canberra.�

So, according to the Government, the situation as at 28 May was that the ADF first knew of the abuses in February when Major O�Kane saw the second Red Cross report, and the Defence leadership and Ministers first knew of them when the photos were published at the end of April.

Remember that 28 May was 7 months after the Red Cross first raised prisoner abuses with the Coalition Provisional Authority (including the embedded Australians); it was more than 4 months after the US issued a press release about the abuse allegations; it was three months after the Red Cross submitted a detailed report to the US; and 1 month after the abuse photos were published. Remember also that the 28 May statement came after the prisoner abuse issue had been running as the number one media issue nationally and internationally for a full four weeks and following exhaustive inquiries of all relevant defence personnel.

Precisely how the Government got it so wrong and maintained such ignorance in these circumstances has still not been explained satisfactorily � certainly not by Senator Hill today. And of course anyone who dared question this unbelievable version of reality was subjected � and has been again today by Senator Hill – to streams of abuse for questioning the integrity of our troops. That is something the Opposition has never done � no matter how hard the Government tries to pretend otherwise.

Since then of course � since the 28 May statement – the Government has been in full retreat. How�s this for classic backsliding � Mr Howard on 30 May: �I�m told by Defence that Major O�Kane has told Defence that the October report did not contain references to the abuse ���I�m just telling you what I have been told.� What I want to know is what else the Prime Minister had been told at that time to warrant such incredibly guarded language.

Then on Tuesday afternoon, 1 June, after one and a half days of questioning at Senate Estimates, Defence Secretary Ric Smith admitted that there were �inaccuracies� in the 28 May statement, �inconsistencies between that statement and the evidence [we] have heard over the last two days.� He explained the 28 May statement �reflected the best knowledge we had at that time�. Since that time, Mr Smith said, the existence of two Red Cross working papers dated October and November 2003 had come to light and, further, Major O�Kane�s understanding that the October report had only raised general concerns as opposed to serious allegations, was incorrect. He and General Cosgrove took full responsibility for the stuffups � to the enormous relief of the Minister beside them – and regretted any embarrassment they had caused the Government.

Mr Howard was also very happy to let his two top Defence officials accept the blame. On 1 June, leaving for the United States, he dumped all over them. �I regret very much that I was given the wrong advice�, �I am very unhappy that I was misinformed by the Defence Department.� Remarkably, while he claimed to have been misled by the Defence Department, he denied he had misled the Parliament and the Australian public: �I did not mislead the public or the Australian Parliament. The advice that I gave the Parliament and the public was based on the advice I�d received from the Defence Department.�

This was a desperate Prime Minister trying to rewrite the doctrine of Ministerial responsibility to avoid any of the mess sticking to him or his ministerial colleagues. Note there was not a mention of the Minister who was presiding over this shambles.

Now, after the indignant denials and subsequent retreat, what we�ve heard today from Senator Hill is yet another grudging apology: � I regret that incorrect information was provided to me and, through me, to the Prime Minister.� As if that�s enough!

I think it�s important at this stage to explain just what it is the Opposition is accusing the Government of.

It is:

� Failure to take seriously the reports of abuse of Iraqi prisoners by US personnel.

� Failure to acknowledge Australia�s legal and moral obligations to Iraqi prisoners in general and those captured by Australian forces in particular.

� Failure to take its accountability responsibilities seriously.

� Failure to correct the serious procedural faults in Defence which were revealed by the �Children Overboard� inquiry.

This is a serious litany of failure by any standard � even the standards of the Howard Government.

Let me take the first of these. Right from the start the Government has demonstrated by its inaction that it does not take the issue of prisoner abuse in Iraq seriously. It is impossible to come to any other conclusion. What did the Government do in response to the US press release about prisoner abuse accusations in mid-January and the CNN reports a few days later? Nothing. Did it think to make inquiries of its Coalition partner about the seriousness and extent of these allegations? No. Did it bother to check whether the allegations involved violation of the Geneva Conventions? It did not. Has it even now bothered to check on the welfare of the 120 Iraqis Australian forces assisted in capturing? No. It doesn�t even care. According to Senator Hill, they were just a drop in the ocean.

When the photos of prisoner abuse were first published on 29 April, provoking shock and outrage around the world, you might have imagined that the Howard Government, as a loyal and close ally of the United States, a strong and unquestioning supporter of its actions in Iraq and an influential member of the Coalition of the Willing, would immediately express its concern to the US. But no. The abuses were not regarded as serious enough to warrant even a diplomatic murmur of disapproval.

You would have thought also that � in the face of such universal outrage and disgust – the Prime Minister, or Minister Hill or Minister Downer, might have been prompted to think �We�re part of what�s happening in Iraq. We�ve got Australian military personnel embedded in the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad. What did they know about this? When did they know it? And what did they do about it?� But no � it was left to others, the media and the Opposition, to ask such questions. And even a month later � on 28 May � the Government wasn�t able to accurately answer them.

It was either not asking any questions, or not asking the right questions or refusing to listen to the answers. Whatever, the Government stands condemned for this massive dereliction of duty.

The Government has also failed to take its legal and moral responsibilities to Iraqi detainees seriously. It has both legal and moral responsibilities as an occupying power and as a member of the Coalition. These responsibilities include ensuring respect for the Geneva Conventions not only in relation to Iraqis captured by Australian forces, but to Iraqi detainees generally.

In fact Mr Downer directly acknowledged these responsibilities in an answer to a question on notice last September, when he said the Government had established a legal watch group to �advise on legal matters of relevance to Australia�s participation in the Coalition Provisional Authority�..and consult with its counterparts to ensure that Australia�s legal obligations are taken into account.�

Since then the Government has been attempting to sidestep the responsibilities flowing from Australia�s participation in the invasion and occupation of Iraq. It argues that Australia is not an Occupying Power, on the basis that the United Nations, in Security Council Resolution 1483, has specifically only recognised the US and UK as Occupying Powers.

However, according to Professor Gillian Triggs of Melbourne University, �Australia has a legal responsibility to all detained persons, whether prisoners of war or civilians, as a Joint Occupying Power in Iraq and as a member of the Coalition� and further �Australia�s continuing obligations as a joint Occupying Power are not altered by Security Council Resolution 1483 in the absence of express termination of its status in relation to future acts.�

The Government also contrived a legal artifice to ensure that Australian troops never officially detained any Iraqi POWs and therefore never triggered the immediate or longer-term responsibilities of a Detaining Power under the third Geneva Convention. The arrangement was that US troops who accompanied the Australian troops would always act as the detaining power, even when POWs were detained by an Australian warship crewed by Australians with only a single US Coast Guard sailor on board.

When we pressed Senator Hill for the legal basis of this arrangement, all he could point to was a letter dated 11 March 2002 from the then Commander of US Central Command to the then Chief of the Australian Defence Forces referring to an agreement negotiated for the conflict in Afghanistan! He was unable to say, he didn�t know, noone in Defence could tell him – how that 2-year old agreement came to be relevant to the conflict in Iraq. And today � in his so-called explanatory statement � he doesn�t even address the issue.

It is incredible after the total incapacity of the Minister and officials at the estimates hearings to explain the legal underpinning for the arrangements relating to the 120 Iraqis captured by Australian forces that Senator hasn�t offered an explanation today. He promised to do this two weeks ago. He still hasn�t done it.

As for the Government�s accountability responsibilities, it has shirked these absolutely. In fact it has rendered the concept of ministerial responsibility virtually meaningless. As I�ve said, on 1 June General Cosgrove and Mr Smith dutifully took �full responsibility� for having provided incorrect advice to the Government and the public. But �taking full responsibility� apparently meant nothing more than mouthing the words.

And neither General Cosgrove nor Mr Smith � nor the Minister today � has offered any explanation as to why, knowing their earlier evidence was incorrect, they waited until the afternoon of Tuesday 1 June before correcting the record. We know the errors in their evidence came to light over the weekend of 29 and 30 May.

So why did Mr Smith tell the Senate Estimates Committee on Monday 31 May that �we know that no Defence personnel were aware of the allegations of abuse or serious mistreatment before the public reports in January� when he must have known this to be untrue? Why did he say the October Red Cross reports were only �about things like prison conditions and so on� when he knew they were not? Why did Mr Carmody fail to acknowledge, when asked, that the October report described serious abuses, when he knew this to be the case?

Were these senior Defence officials hoping we would not pursue these issues, and that they may not have to correct the record? Why else would they have sat there in estimates biting their tongues for a day and a half before putting the facts on the record? We are at least entitled to an explanation of what, on the face of it, appears to be a contempt of parliament. Yet Senator Hill � illustrating the culture he appears to preside over in Defence � has simply ignored this serious issue.

The Prime Minister, as I have said, has adopted a trenchant �Don�t blame me. It�s all Defence�s fault� approach. After all, he�s just the Prime Minister.

And Senator Hill himself? The Minister who, according to Mr Howard�s code of ministerial conduct is �ultimately accountable for the overall operation of his portfolio�? The Minister who bravely asserted when asked when the government became aware of the prisoner abuse �I accept the responsibilities that flow from that�? How has he discharged his accountability obligations? By doing nothing more than presenting half-baked excuses to the Senate weeks too late. He hasn�t even done it as a proper Ministerial statement. He�s avoided this by simply providing additional information to an answer given to a question asked five weeks ago. That�s not good enough, Senator Hill, nowhere near good enough. If ministerial responsibility is to mean anything Senator Hill has to resign.

Ignorance of matters such as these does not absolve a Minister from responsibility. In fact it only compounds Senator Hill�s responsibility. After all Senator Hill is � in the words of Jack Waterford in an excellent article in the Canberra Times [on 6 June] � �a paranoid and suspicious minister�who distrusts all of his advisers [and] is a compulsive micromanager who wants to know everything.� He�s had almost three years at the helm of Defence. If he�s been kept in the dark, then he must accept responsibility for having created, or failed to correct, the circumstances and environment that have kept him in the dark.

There are uncanny parallels between the Government�s handling of the prisoner abuse scandal and the �children overboard� affair: the same obstinate refusal on the part of the Prime Minister and other Ministers to seek out the truth; the same reluctance on the part of senior officials and advisers to pass on unwelcome or inconvenient advice to their political masters; the same Nixonian culture of plausible deniability.

Then, as now, neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister for Defence accepted any responsibility. Then, as now, the Government made Defence the scapegoat. Then, as now, the Chief of the Defence Force and the Secretary of Defence set up a task force. Back then, it was to examine �the range of internal and external communication issues flowing from the [children overboard] incident�.

Following the report of that task force, Senator Hill issued a press release, on 22 October 2002, claiming that it was �confusion surrounding the [children overboard] incident that led to inaccurate information being given to the Government�. Not to worry, he had instructed Defence �to move quickly to �.ensure there is no repeat of the communication problems experienced ..�.

He claimed to have already ensured �a clearer understanding of the incident reporting requirements through the chain of command and the passing of such information to the Minister�s office.� �Ministers and decision makers within Defence� he said, �must be confident that the information they are acting on is delivered in a timely and accurate manner.� And this: �I also accept there is a responsibility to ensure there are clear lines of communication between the Minister�s office and Defence.� Yes Minister � your responsibility! And one you have patently failed to deliver on.

If the Prime Minister wants us to believe the Government is serious about respect for the Geneva Conventions, if he wants the Australian people to have confidence in the leadership of our Defence Forces and Defence Department, if he is to demand even the most minimal standards of competence from his Ministry, if he is to attach any meaning at all to the doctrine of ministerial responsibility � then he has no alternative but to sack Senator Hill.

This is yesterday’s reply by Labor Senate Leader John Faulkner to Robert Hill’s “statement” on Australia’s cover-up of the Abu Ghraib torture scandal.

 

This much-heralded statement, this comprehensive explanation promised two weeks ago by the Prime Minister, is a disgrace. It�s a damp squib. It�s not an explanation. It�s a whitewash.

The Government insists on responding to allegations that have not been made. The Opposition has not � does not � accuse Australian troops of having been involved in the abuse of prisoners. This is a straw man put up by the Government. After all it�s so much easier for Mr Howard and his colleagues to defend Australian troops against imagined slurs than to address the real and uncomfortable issues this saga has raised.

This so-called statement is just the last in a litany of failures for which Senator Hill must take ultimate responsibility.

What it reveals is a supine Government, a dysfunctional department and a Minister asleep at the wheel.

Senator Hill blames the Opposition � for indulging in smear tactics and claims of cover-up. He blames Defence � for providing inaccurate information to the Government. He blames everybody but himself.

This is a Minister more concerned about self-preservation than decent standards. His statement is full of excuses � there�s nothing about consequences.

And the logical consequence of a fiasco such as this is the big gap in Senator Hill�s statement � his own resignation.

This is the Minister who, 20 months ago, in the wake of the �children overboard� scandal, promised to fix the very problems which have caused this mess. He has failed abysmally.

The Prime Minister, the Minister for Defence and senior Defence officials seriously misled the Australian parliament and people about what the Government knew and when, in relation to the abuse of Coalition detainees in Iraq. And the only excuse Senator Hill can offer is �It was the best we knew at the time.� We hear today Senator Hill has apologised to the Prime Minister. What about apologising to the Parliament and the Australian people?

Remember that on 27 May in the House of Representatives, Mr Howard said it was not until February of this year that a report by the Red Cross raised allegations of ill treatment of detainees. An earlier report in October 2003 had covered only �general concerns about detainee conditions and treatment�. He went on to say: �To suggest that, because Major O�Kane drafted a response to the October report, he or the Australian government were in some way aware of the more serious allegations�.. is quite nonsensical.

In the Senate, Senator Hill told us on 11 May that Defence and the Government �became aware of the International Red Cross report in February�. When asked when he personally became aware of the prisoner abuse, he said �I am not going to split myself from the Government� and �I accept the responsibilities that flow from that.� I�ll come back to the issue of Senator Hill�s responsibility.

Persistent questioning by the media and the Opposition following the publication of the abuse photos at the end of April led Defence to conduct an inquiry � its first inquiry – into its state of knowledge of the abuses.

The results of that inquiry, which included a survey of 298 members of the Defence forces, were announced by the Chief of the Defence Force, General Cosgrove and the Secretary of Defence, Mr Ric Smith, on 28 May. We were informed that �none of those surveyed were aware of abuse or serious mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners or detainees, of the nature of recent allegations, during their deployment� and �there were no reports about the abuse or serious mistreatment of prisoners or detainees of the nature of recent allegations made, either through the chain of command or informally.�

General Cosgrove and Mr Smith informed us that Major O�Kane had said that �the October 2003 [Red Cross] report raised general concerns about detainee conditions and treatment, but no mention of abuse.� As for the top brass? �Neither the current Australian Joint Force Commander in the Middle East or any of his predecessors was aware of these allegations of abuse or serious mistreatment � until the publication of photographs in April 2004, and neither was Defence leadership in Canberra.�

So, according to the Government, the situation as at 28 May was that the ADF first knew of the abuses in February when Major O�Kane saw the second Red Cross report, and the Defence leadership and Ministers first knew of them when the photos were published at the end of April.

Remember that 28 May was 7 months after the Red Cross first raised prisoner abuses with the Coalition Provisional Authority (including the embedded Australians); it was more than 4 months after the US issued a press release about the abuse allegations; it was three months after the Red Cross submitted a detailed report to the US; and 1 month after the abuse photos were published. Remember also that the 28 May statement came after the prisoner abuse issue had been running as the number one media issue nationally and internationally for a full four weeks and following exhaustive inquiries of all relevant defence personnel.

Precisely how the Government got it so wrong and maintained such ignorance in these circumstances has still not been explained satisfactorily � certainly not by Senator Hill today. And of course anyone who dared question this unbelievable version of reality was subjected � and has been again today by Senator Hill – to streams of abuse for questioning the integrity of our troops. That is something the Opposition has never done � no matter how hard the Government tries to pretend otherwise.

Since then of course � since the 28 May statement – the Government has been in full retreat. How�s this for classic backsliding � Mr Howard on 30 May: �I�m told by Defence that Major O�Kane has told Defence that the October report did not contain references to the abuse ���I�m just telling you what I have been told.� What I want to know is what else the Prime Minister had been told at that time to warrant such incredibly guarded language.

Then on Tuesday afternoon, 1 June, after one and a half days of questioning at Senate Estimates, Defence Secretary Ric Smith admitted that there were �inaccuracies� in the 28 May statement, �inconsistencies between that statement and the evidence [we] have heard over the last two days.� He explained the 28 May statement �reflected the best knowledge we had at that time�. Since that time, Mr Smith said, the existence of two Red Cross working papers dated October and November 2003 had come to light and, further, Major O�Kane�s understanding that the October report had only raised general concerns as opposed to serious allegations, was incorrect. He and General Cosgrove took full responsibility for the stuffups � to the enormous relief of the Minister beside them – and regretted any embarrassment they had caused the Government.

Mr Howard was also very happy to let his two top Defence officials accept the blame. On 1 June, leaving for the United States, he dumped all over them. �I regret very much that I was given the wrong advice�, �I am very unhappy that I was misinformed by the Defence Department.� Remarkably, while he claimed to have been misled by the Defence Department, he denied he had misled the Parliament and the Australian public: �I did not mislead the public or the Australian Parliament. The advice that I gave the Parliament and the public was based on the advice I�d received from the Defence Department.�

This was a desperate Prime Minister trying to rewrite the doctrine of Ministerial responsibility to avoid any of the mess sticking to him or his ministerial colleagues. Note there was not a mention of the Minister who was presiding over this shambles.

Now, after the indignant denials and subsequent retreat, what we�ve heard today from Senator Hill is yet another grudging apology: � I regret that incorrect information was provided to me and, through me, to the Prime Minister.� As if that�s enough!

I think it�s important at this stage to explain just what it is the Opposition is accusing the Government of.

It is:

� Failure to take seriously the reports of abuse of Iraqi prisoners by US personnel.

� Failure to acknowledge Australia�s legal and moral obligations to Iraqi prisoners in general and those captured by Australian forces in particular.

� Failure to take its accountability responsibilities seriously.

� Failure to correct the serious procedural faults in Defence which were revealed by the �Children Overboard� inquiry.

This is a serious litany of failure by any standard � even the standards of the Howard Government.

Let me take the first of these. Right from the start the Government has demonstrated by its inaction that it does not take the issue of prisoner abuse in Iraq seriously. It is impossible to come to any other conclusion. What did the Government do in response to the US press release about prisoner abuse accusations in mid-January and the CNN reports a few days later? Nothing. Did it think to make inquiries of its Coalition partner about the seriousness and extent of these allegations? No. Did it bother to check whether the allegations involved violation of the Geneva Conventions? It did not. Has it even now bothered to check on the welfare of the 120 Iraqis Australian forces assisted in capturing? No. It doesn�t even care. According to Senator Hill, they were just a drop in the ocean.

When the photos of prisoner abuse were first published on 29 April, provoking shock and outrage around the world, you might have imagined that the Howard Government, as a loyal and close ally of the United States, a strong and unquestioning supporter of its actions in Iraq and an influential member of the Coalition of the Willing, would immediately express its concern to the US. But no. The abuses were not regarded as serious enough to warrant even a diplomatic murmur of disapproval.

You would have thought also that � in the face of such universal outrage and disgust – the Prime Minister, or Minister Hill or Minister Downer, might have been prompted to think �We�re part of what�s happening in Iraq. We�ve got Australian military personnel embedded in the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad. What did they know about this? When did they know it? And what did they do about it?� But no � it was left to others, the media and the Opposition, to ask such questions. And even a month later � on 28 May � the Government wasn�t able to accurately answer them.

It was either not asking any questions, or not asking the right questions or refusing to listen to the answers. Whatever, the Government stands condemned for this massive dereliction of duty.

The Government has also failed to take its legal and moral responsibilities to Iraqi detainees seriously. It has both legal and moral responsibilities as an occupying power and as a member of the Coalition. These responsibilities include ensuring respect for the Geneva Conventions not only in relation to Iraqis captured by Australian forces, but to Iraqi detainees generally.

In fact Mr Downer directly acknowledged these responsibilities in an answer to a question on notice last September, when he said the Government had established a legal watch group to �advise on legal matters of relevance to Australia�s participation in the Coalition Provisional Authority�..and consult with its counterparts to ensure that Australia�s legal obligations are taken into account.�

Since then the Government has been attempting to sidestep the responsibilities flowing from Australia�s participation in the invasion and occupation of Iraq. It argues that Australia is not an Occupying Power, on the basis that the United Nations, in Security Council Resolution 1483, has specifically only recognised the US and UK as Occupying Powers.

However, according to Professor Gillian Triggs of Melbourne University, �Australia has a legal responsibility to all detained persons, whether prisoners of war or civilians, as a Joint Occupying Power in Iraq and as a member of the Coalition� and further �Australia�s continuing obligations as a joint Occupying Power are not altered by Security Council Resolution 1483 in the absence of express termination of its status in relation to future acts.�

The Government also contrived a legal artifice to ensure that Australian troops never officially detained any Iraqi POWs and therefore never triggered the immediate or longer-term responsibilities of a Detaining Power under the third Geneva Convention. The arrangement was that US troops who accompanied the Australian troops would always act as the detaining power, even when POWs were detained by an Australian warship crewed by Australians with only a single US Coast Guard sailor on board.

When we pressed Senator Hill for the legal basis of this arrangement, all he could point to was a letter dated 11 March 2002 from the then Commander of US Central Command to the then Chief of the Australian Defence Forces referring to an agreement negotiated for the conflict in Afghanistan! He was unable to say, he didn�t know, noone in Defence could tell him – how that 2-year old agreement came to be relevant to the conflict in Iraq. And today � in his so-called explanatory statement � he doesn�t even address the issue.

It is incredible after the total incapacity of the Minister and officials at the estimates hearings to explain the legal underpinning for the arrangements relating to the 120 Iraqis captured by Australian forces that Senator hasn�t offered an explanation today. He promised to do this two weeks ago. He still hasn�t done it.

As for the Government�s accountability responsibilities, it has shirked these absolutely. In fact it has rendered the concept of ministerial responsibility virtually meaningless. As I�ve said, on 1 June General Cosgrove and Mr Smith dutifully took �full responsibility� for having provided incorrect advice to the Government and the public. But �taking full responsibility� apparently meant nothing more than mouthing the words.

And neither General Cosgrove nor Mr Smith � nor the Minister today � has offered any explanation as to why, knowing their earlier evidence was incorrect, they waited until the afternoon of Tuesday 1 June before correcting the record. We know the errors in their evidence came to light over the weekend of 29 and 30 May.

So why did Mr Smith tell the Senate Estimates Committee on Monday 31 May that �we know that no Defence personnel were aware of the allegations of abuse or serious mistreatment before the public reports in January� when he must have known this to be untrue? Why did he say the October Red Cross reports were only �about things like prison conditions and so on� when he knew they were not? Why did Mr Carmody fail to acknowledge, when asked, that the October report described serious abuses, when he knew this to be the case?

Were these senior Defence officials hoping we would not pursue these issues, and that they may not have to correct the record? Why else would they have sat there in estimates biting their tongues for a day and a half before putting the facts on the record? We are at least entitled to an explanation of what, on the face of it, appears to be a contempt of parliament. Yet Senator Hill � illustrating the culture he appears to preside over in Defence � has simply ignored this serious issue.

The Prime Minister, as I have said, has adopted a trenchant �Don�t blame me. It�s all Defence�s fault� approach. After all, he�s just the Prime Minister.

And Senator Hill himself? The Minister who, according to Mr Howard�s code of ministerial conduct is �ultimately accountable for the overall operation of his portfolio�? The Minister who bravely asserted when asked when the government became aware of the prisoner abuse �I accept the responsibilities that flow from that�? How has he discharged his accountability obligations? By doing nothing more than presenting half-baked excuses to the Senate weeks too late. He hasn�t even done it as a proper Ministerial statement. He�s avoided this by simply providing additional information to an answer given to a question asked five weeks ago. That�s not good enough, Senator Hill, nowhere near good enough. If ministerial responsibility is to mean anything Senator Hill has to resign.

Ignorance of matters such as these does not absolve a Minister from responsibility. In fact it only compounds Senator Hill�s responsibility. After all Senator Hill is � in the words of Jack Waterford in an excellent article in the Canberra Times [on 6 June] � �a paranoid and suspicious minister�who distrusts all of his advisers [and] is a compulsive micromanager who wants to know everything.� He�s had almost three years at the helm of Defence. If he�s been kept in the dark, then he must accept responsibility for having created, or failed to correct, the circumstances and environment that have kept him in the dark.

There are uncanny parallels between the Government�s handling of the prisoner abuse scandal and the �children overboard� affair: the same obstinate refusal on the part of the Prime Minister and other Ministers to seek out the truth; the same reluctance on the part of senior officials and advisers to pass on unwelcome or inconvenient advice to their political masters; the same Nixonian culture of plausible deniability.

Then, as now, neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister for Defence accepted any responsibility. Then, as now, the Government made Defence the scapegoat. Then, as now, the Chief of the Defence Force and the Secretary of Defence set up a task force. Back then, it was to examine �the range of internal and external communication issues flowing from the [children overboard] incident�.

Following the report of that task force, Senator Hill issued a press release, on 22 October 2002, claiming that it was �confusion surrounding the [children overboard] incident that led to inaccurate information being given to the Government�. Not to worry, he had instructed Defence �to move quickly to �.ensure there is no repeat of the communication problems experienced ..�.

He claimed to have already ensured �a clearer understanding of the incident reporting requirements through the chain of command and the passing of such information to the Minister�s office.� �Ministers and decision makers within Defence� he said, �must be confident that the information they are acting on is delivered in a timely and accurate manner.� And this: �I also accept there is a responsibility to ensure there are clear lines of communication between the Minister�s office and Defence.� Yes Minister � your responsibility! And one you have patently failed to deliver on.

If the Prime Minister wants us to believe the Government is serious about respect for the Geneva Conventions, if he wants the Australian people to have confidence in the leadership of our Defence Forces and Defence Department, if he is to demand even the most minimal standards of competence from his Ministry, if he is to attach any meaning at all to the doctrine of ministerial responsibility � then he has no alternative but to sack Senator Hill.

Hi. Now Howard wants to rush through the American Free Trade Agreement legislation before it’s been properly investigated. Here’s the submission to the Senate’s inquiry by the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies. For more submissions, see SenateFTA

 

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The Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies (FASTS) is the peak representative body for 60,000 scientists and technologists.

FASTS was established in 1985 and has approximately 65 member organisations. FASTS is well known in Parliamentary circles as the initiator and co-ordinator of the highly successful �Science Meets Parliament� and the President of FASTS is a member of the Prime Minister�s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council (PMSEIC).

FASTS do not have a formal position on whether Australia should ratify the draft Aus-US Free Trade Agreement.

There are, however, a number of implications for science that we would like to draw to the attention of the committee.

INVESTMENT � Chapter 11

FASTS are concerned that provisions of the draft FTA liberalizing US investment in Australia may diminish Australia�s capacity to maximize benefits from publicly funded R&D.

It is well recognized that R&D intensive small and medium enteprises (SMEs) in science and technology are crucial for economic growth and success in the global economy. However, the national benefits generated by R&D intensive SMEs are at risk if the Australian Government does not exercise oversight of foreign takeovers, specifically foreign takeovers that may result in production, jobs and export opportunities being taken offshore.

It is manifestly not in Australia�s national interest if we simply allow multinational firms to cherry-pick Australia�s most promising and innovative technology SMEs with no constraints or oversight.It is manifestly not in Australia�s national interest if we simply allow multinational firms to cherry-pick Australia�s most promising and innovative technology SMEs with no constraints or oversight.

FASTS believes the investment provisions in the draft FTA are not consistent with a key policy objective of Backing Australia�s Ability to strengthen the capacity of Australian inventions being commercialized by Australian firms and exported into the global market.

FASTS recommends:

 the Committee consider striking out provisions relating to technology transfer and domestic content in 11.9 (Performance requirements);

 the Committee request the Government review terms and conditions of publicly funded research with a view to developing relevant and transparent �national benefits� tests for commercialization of publicly funded research; including conditions requiring Government approval of grant recipients to locate operations and/or production offshore.

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BENEFITS OF INVESTMENT PROVISIONS

A long-standing constraint on developing and commercializing Australian R&D has been the lack of venture capital throughout the R&D process. Thus it is plausible that measures in the draft FTA which encourage US investment in Australia may provide;

 additional investment;

 reductions in the cost of capital; and

 enhanced technology transfer between Australian and US firms.

Risks of Investment provisions

FASTS believes a combination of factors, including;

 Changes in global R&D practices towards large firms purchasing technology and intellectual property through mergers and acquisition of R&D intensive SMEs;

 Shift in Government R&D policy towards public funding of commercialization;

 Inadequate coverage of �national benefits� conditions on recipients of public funding of R&D;

 Liberalising capacity for US takeovers of Australian firms in the draft FTA; and

 constraints on the scope of terms and conditions of Government grants and subsidies for R&D in the draft FTA;

may result in Australia losing the benefits of publicly-funded R&D through takeovers of R&D intensive SMEs and subsequent transfer of IP, know-how, jobs and export opportunities offshore.

By way of contrast, the US, through the Bayh-Dole Act and conditions on publicly funded R&D grants, maintains strict controls and barriers on foreign takeovers and offshore relocation of US firms derived from licencing of publicly-funded R&D.

Change in international business R&D practices

Since the mid-1990s it has become apparent that there are significant changes in how business R&D (BERD) is performed, notably in OECD countries.

With some exceptions, including Australia, Italy and the UK, business investment in R&D grew considerably in real terms and as a percentage of GDP in the 1990s. Two important characteristics of that growth are;

a) substantial increase in R&D alliances, mergers and acquisitions, and

b) significant increase of SMEs� share of BERD.

The growing reliance on externally developed IP by large firms is particularly notable in the growth of mergers and acquisitions of small, R&D intensive SMEs by multinational high technology firms.

Focus on Commercialization in Government Policy

An important theme in innovation and R&D public policy debates is the need for Australia to maximize the benefits of publicly funded research and Australian innovation through successful commercialization of Australian ideas and inventions.

This is explicitly taken up in the recently announced Backing Australia�s Ability: Building Our Future Through Science and Innovation program notably in the $1 billion Commercial Ready suite of programs which are designed to �strengthen the capacity of Australian small and medium-sized businesses to take competitive ideas to market.�

Informally, this policy intent is often described as �we need more Cochlears and ResMeds�.

The focus on commercialization is evident in other Government R&D programs notably the change in selection criteria of CRCs announced in December 2003.

Existing constraints on transferring ownership

Despite the Government�s policy intent to maximize the benefits for Australia of commercializing Australian inventions and innovations, there are few constraints in the existing framework to prevent foreign takeover of Australian firms, and subsequent relocation of production offshore, derived from publicly-funded R&D.

The Industry Research & Development Board (IR&DB), which administers a number of Commonwealth industry R&D programs, are required to consider �National Benefits� when assessing applications for various programs including R&D Start and COMET.

The �National Benefits� test includes consideration of an application�s capacity to contribute to national productivity and economic growth, diffusion of knowledge and skills and societal, community and ecological benefits.

The potential benefits or necessity of overseas commercialization are explicitly allowed for and in these circumstances the IR&DB considers applicants� level of commitment to retaining or enhancing the firm�s R&D facilities in Australia and technology transfer arrangements from overseas to Australia.

A condition of R&D Start and COMET contracts is grant recipients cannot vary the grant conditions, including ownership, without the permission within 10 years of commencement of the grant. In the event of a proposed takeover or variation to contract, the IR&DB may consider elements of the �national benefits� test including technology transfer arrangements.

If an application to allow overseas commercialization fails the �national benefits� test, the IR&DB may terminate the project agreement and require repayment of relevant grants or loans.

FASTS believes the scope of the �national benefits� test will be constrained by the performance requirements provisions (11.9) of the draft FTA, notably in respect of technology transfer (see below).

There are no commensurate provisions to the �national benefits� test of the IR&DB in other publicly funded R&D initiatives including Australian Research Council (ARC) or National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC). Moreover, should a future Government seek to develop �national benefits� criteria the draft FTA will constrain the scope of such a test.

Liberalization of investment in Draft FTA

The draft FTA requires that each party accord to investors of the other party national treatment (11.3) or Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) (11.4) treatment for the �establishment, acquisition, expansion, management, conduct, operation, and sale or other disposition of investments�.

Various non-conforming measures, notably for media, property, Telstra and Qantas are listed in Annex 1 and Annex II.

A key measure in Annex I lifts the threshold by which foreign investment in Australian firms needs to be notified to the Australian Government�s Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) from $50m to $800m for most industries, including manufacturing and agriculture (Annex 11-I Australia-5 (c)).

FASTS notes the �ratchet� provisions of 11.13.(c) that cover Annex I means a future Government could further liberalise this threshold but could not make it more restrictive if it became apparent that lack of oversight and analysis of investment proposals was having a detrimental effect including takeovers of our most promising R&D intensive firms.

Constraints On Terms and Conditions of Government Grants And Subsidies for Publicly-funded R&D

Chapter 10 (Cross Border Trade In Services) and Chapter 11 (Investment) provide exemptions from other liberalizing provisions in the draft FTA for Government subsidies and grants, including subsidies and grants for R&D.

In the case of trade in services; subsidies, grants, Government-supported loans, guarantees and insurance are exempt from all other provisions in Chapter 10 (10.4.(d)).

However, the scope of exemptions for goods is much narrower than for services.

Government provision of subsidies and grants for goods is not required to comply with provisions affecting national treatment (11.3), most-favoured-nation (11.4) and senior management and boards of directors (11.10).

However, provisions preventing the imposition on investors of a comprehensive range of performance requirements (11.9) including technology transfer (11.9.1.(f)) and domestic content requirements (11.9.2(a)) do apply to grants and subsidies.

This may have a direct impact on the existing terms and conditions of R&D Start and COMET and may adversely constrain the capacity of the Government to implement �national benefits� criteria to other publicly-funded R&D programs such as the ARC, Universities and NHMRC.

As discussed below, the US currently requires that firms with a licence for IP derived from federally funded research are required to substantially manufacture in the US. This performance requirement is, at face value, inconsistent with the provision that requires domestic content requirements cannot apply to Government grants and subsidies. It is not clear whether the US intends to change its law to ensure consistency with the FTA, nor is there anything in the US annexes that go to this.

Bayh-Dole Act (US)

The policy intent of the Patent and Trademark Amendment Act (1980) – commonly called the Bayh-Dole Act – is to maximize the economic benefits of federally funded R&D for the US by ensuring inventions from federally funded research are made available to the US public for the US public�s benefit (35 U.S.C. s.200).

Essentially, the Act requires inventors/researchers to maximize the opportunities to commercialise inventions that emerge from federally funded R&D.

Inventors/researchers may elect to own and exercise IP rights of their inventions (s. 202(a)), providing they take out a patent (s.202(c)). However, the US Government can claim ownership if an inventor does not exercise this right, take out a patent or commercialization is not reasonably pursued (use-it or lose-it) (s. 202(c), s.203). Where inventors do not take out title or fail to meet their obligations, the US Government licences the IP to US firms.

In addition, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) maintains rights to all NIH federally funded inventions including a non-exclusive, non-transferable paid-up licence to practice or have practiced for, or on behalf of, the US any invention anywhere in the world.

The Act also requires that licenses of IP created from federal funds can only be awarded to firms who will substantially manufacture in the US and imposes significant constraints on foreign takeovers or attempts to take manufacturing offshore (s.204).

Under Bayh-Dole, the US Government retains the right to approve or not approve any decision of a relevant firm with a licence to relocate production offshore. The only circumstances that the US Government permits inventions derived from federally funded R&D offshore are when it is not commercially feasible to manufacture in the US or the grantee has not been successful in their attempts to licence the patent to domestic US industry.

Federal funding agencies including the NIH stipulate in their terms and conditions of grants that grantees/contractors are required to comply with all provisions of Bayh-Dole.

Foreign recipients of NIH funding – Australia is second to Canada in success of foreign NIH grantees – are also bound by Bayh-Dole provisions.

In 2002, the NIH proposed a further policy change whereby foreign recipients of grants could only exercise IP rights in their country while the NIH would hold all rights for the rest of the world. This policy is not yet in effect but highlights the asymmetry between the NIH and the NHMRC.

Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB)

It could be argued that lifting the threshold for notification to FIRB for US investment in manufacturing from $50 m to $800 m will make little difference in practice as the Government, through FIRB, have only rejected 4 out of 2285 investment proposals from all countries in the past 5 years.

This success rate reflects current Government policy. However, should Government policy change in the future as a response, for example, to cherry-picking by multinational firms of Australia�s most promising companies, the increased threshold will preclude examination of a considerable proportion of Australian firms including all science and technology R&D intensive SMEs.

FASTS understands FIRB do not collect data on the ownership or origin of intellectual property in investment proposals. Thus its current operating practices mean it is not in a position to identify firms developed around IP generated from publicly-funded R&D.

Firms in receipt of publicly funded support of R&D

Thousands of Australian firms have received public funding for R&D and innovation including;

 560 R&D Start grants and loans to the value of $552 million since 1 July 2000. (Cochlear received R&D Start grants in its developmental stage)

 138 Biotechnology Innovation Fund grants since inception in 2000

 800 grants approved in COMET since 1999

 275 start-up companies have been accepted into the incubators program of Building Information Technology Strengths (BITS)

 4707 companies had registered for the R&D tax concession by August 2003 for FY 2001-02. Nearly 600 SMEs registered for the 125% R&D tax offset for 2001-02 and nearly 500 firms registered for the 175% R&D Tax premium in the same year.

 61 companies have received Innovation Investment Fund (IIF) funding since inception.

In addition, the ARC awarded 921 Discovery grants for the 2003 round and 586 new linkage grants in the two rounds October 2002 and May 2003 and in 2003 the NHMRC approved 911 new grants.

The outcomes of many of these grants � and research in public sector research agencies such as CSIRO, AIMS and ANSTO – will produce new IP, which will provide commercial opportunities for existing Australian firms or drive new spin-off companies.

Recommendations

While acknowledging possible benefits from US investment in Australian firms, FASTS believes the Committee must consider the possible negative impacts of the draft FTA in terms of maximizing public benefits of commercializing Australian R&D.

FASTS recommends;

 the Committee consider striking out provisions relating to technology transfer and domestic content in 11.9 (Performance requirements);

 the Committee request the Government review terms and conditions of publicly funded research with a view to developing relevant and transparent �national benefits� tests for commercialization of publicly funded research; including conditions requiring Government approval of grant recipients to locate operations and/or production offshore.

FASTS notes however, that IP arrangements and issues around commercialization of publicly-funded research are highly complex, particularly when it involves multiple sources of funding and investment.

FASTS believes the key public policy intent of the Bayh-Dole Act to maximize public benefits from publicly funded research is highly commendable. We do not, however, recommend that Australia simply adopt Bayh-Dole provisions.

The need for examination of these issues is urgent and any changes to current arrangements will require careful consideration and detailed consultation with universities, CSIRO, ARC, NHMRC, industry, IPA and others in the research and intellectual property sectors.

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SANITARY AND PHYTOSANITARY MEASURES � Ch. 7 Background

FASTS believes that good science is a necessary condition of robust policy, import risk assessment and regulation of sanitary measures.

Invasive species and introduced diseases have had major impacts on the environment and commercial agriculture and aquaculture (eg cane toads and phylloxera). To date, conservative quarantine practices have played an important role in Australia avoiding or minimizing exposure to diseases and pests that have seriously damaged agricultural production in other countries (eg fire blight). Indeed, Australia�s reputation for being comparatively clean and low in disease, has given Australian agricultural exporters competitive advantages in many markets.

However, a number of factors are increasing the risk to Australia�s environment, human, plant and animal health and commercial agriculture, including

 increasing flows of people, goods and services;

 climate change;

 reduced investment in relevant education and research disciplines such as parasitology; and  growing resistance of diseases and parasites to chemical controls; and

 apparent changes in regulatory practices.

In short, the importance of good science informing policy and risk assessment is increasing.

Assumptions about risk that may be robust today could well be invalid in the future as a consequence of climate change. Australia exposes itself to great risk if we become complacent, fail to support relevant research and monitoring or allow trade considerations to undermine proper scientific analysis.

FASTS Recommends;

 The Committee urge the Government initiate reform of Biosecurity Australia�s objectives and operations.

Objectives

The DFAT Guide To The Agreement states: Nothing in the chapter undermines the right of either party to determine the level of protection it considers appropriate (p. 35).

FASTS is not so confident that this is so. The objectives of Chapter 7 go explicitly to resolving trade issues �and thereby expand trade opportunities�.

The draft agreement provides for the creation of two bi-lateral Sanitary and Phytosanitary Committees � a general committee and a Standing Technical Working Group on Animal and Plant Health Measures.

The objectives of the general committee include �protecting human, animal, or plant life� and �facilitate trade between the parties� (7.4.3).

The objectives of the technical working group are to �resolve specific bilateral animal and plant health matters with a view to facilitating trade (Annex 7-A 4(a)).�

That is, there may be an intrinsic conflict in the objectives of both committees.

FASTS notes that US agribusiness interests have clearly interpreted the new arrangements as a concession by Australia to the USA.

Clearly, that is the interpretation of the American Farm Bureau Federation who state in their press release of 10 March 2004:

AFBF’s analysis of the proposed free trade agreement forecasts that annual exports of high-value U.S. food products to Australia will grow by $150 million to $200 million after that nation removes non-tariff trade barriers, particularly in the area of sanitary/phytosanitary rules.

FASTS believes scientific analysis of risk must have priority over trade imperatives.

We are concerned that both the objectives of the committees and their character as bureaucratic instruments to facilitate trade may undermine the fundamental role that proper scientific analysis must have in a sound quarantine system.

Our concern is compounded by the fact that there are no provisions requiring independent scientific expertise on the membership of either committee.

If the draft FTA is ratified then confidence in the two bi-lateral committees will be highly dependent on the capacity and approach of the lead Australian agency, Biosecurity Australia.

Biosecurity Australia

FASTS is aware that the confidence of agriculture sectors and relevant scientists in Biosecurity Australia is diminishing over time due to concerns that trade considerations are inappropriately prioritized over scientific analysis of risk. Recent debates and decisions over pineapples, Atlantic salmon, apples and pig meat have raised skepticism of Biosecurity Australia�s capacity to make good judgments.

More specifically, scientists are concerned with the changing culture within Biosecurity Australia, including

 Increasing emphasis on a �least trade restrictive� approach that has the potential to undermine the science base of IRA;

 Attempts by Biosecurity Australia representatives to �direct� IRA teams toward facilitating trade;

 Inadequate record keeping of Import Risk Assessment (IRA) committees; and

 Scientific errors in Biosecurity Australia�s modeling and data;

For some detailed evidence and discussion of such concerns FASTS draws the attention of the Committee to the three Senate Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Committee inquiries into the Import Risk Analysis of bananas, apples and pork meat.

Evidence presented to that committee raises serious concerns over Biosecurity Australia�s procedures and culture consistent with the concerns noted above.

FASTS believe the arguments for significant reform of Biosecurity Australia�s processes and objectives are strong. We recommend the Government initiate reform of Biosecurity Australia with some urgency. This should be done irrespective of Parliament�s determination on the draft FTA.

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INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY � PATENTS (ch. 17.9)

Background

The patent system is crucial to encourage R&D innovation and FASTS are broadly supportive of changes in the Australian patent system in the past few years to lift the threshold of patentability and improve the capacity of patent holders to protect patents.

Patents can, however, be a serious constraint on research.

FASTS believe that patents should not be permissible for factual scientific information including naturally occurring genes and gene sequences.

There is considerable international concern over the issuing of gene patents. There arguments against issuing patents for genes and gene sequences include ethical arguments, constraints on bona fide research and discovery of a gene or gene sequence does not satisfy a fundamental – and internationally recognised criteria for a patent – that it should be an invention.

Such concerns have resulted in major biotechnology research initiatives including the Human Genome Project and the International Haplotype Mapping (HapMap) Project placing their research results in the public domain with no constraints or costs on access for researchers.

No jurisdiction in the world permits patenting of genes or gene sequences per se. Debates over what is patentable typically revolve around questions of isolable genes and gene sequences.

It is fair to say that there is a widespread belief internationally that the US Patent system � unquestionably the most powerful patent regime in the world – has not got the balance of interests right and patents have been issued for isolable genes and gene sequences that stretch the criteria of patentability beyond what many scientists, ethicists and legislators consider as acceptable. The European Union, for instance, is vigorously opposed to the USA approach.

FTA Provisions

It is not clear what implications there are for the Australian patent system in the draft FTA.

The advice FASTS have received from DFAT is that the patent provisions in the draft FTA are consistent with existing Australian law so presumably there will be no changes at all or no changes of substance.

However, there does appear to be some variance between the proposals in the draft FTA and the current Patent Act 1990.

For example, article 17.9.1, seems to imply a broader definition of patents by changing the definition of invention. It makes the USA and Australia provide patents for �any invention � provided � (it) � is new, involves an inventive step, and is capable of industrial application�. Presumably, this will replace the current definition in Schedule 1 of the Patents Act 1990, which defines invention as �a manner of new manufacture within the meaning of s.6 of the Statute of Monopolies�. That statute lists a number of exclusions including that a patent is �not contrary to the law, nor mischievous to the state by raising of the prices of commodities at home or hurt of trade, or generally inconvenient�. The scope of this exclusions list is not, however, replicated in 17.9.2(a).

17.9.2(b) does allow for a change in Australian law. It provides that parties may exclude �diagnostic, therapeutic and surgical methods for the treatment of humans and animals�. Under current Australian law exclusions relate to generating a human being (Patent Act (1990) s.19(2)). FASTS understand that the Federal Court has allowed that treatments are patentable.

In addition, article 17.9.3 refers to �exclusive rights� but these aren�t defined elsewhere in the chapter so we are not sure exactly what this might mean.

Accordingly, FASTS are unable to really determine whether there are any substantive implications for science and R&D that are specific to the patent provisions in the draft FTA. Close examination of any legislation will be required.

We note that in some of the commentary surrounding the FTA, the Government has stated �Australians will benefit through closer harmonisation of our already strong intellectual property regime with that of the largest intellectual property market in the world�.

It is not clear to FASTS what the scope of �harmonisation� will mean in practice.

As the committee will be aware, law operates at a variety of levels including parliamentary legislation and regulation; judicial, including case law; and administrative and normative practices of agencies.

There is a view that the apparent expansion in the US of what is patentable in respect of genes and gene sequences seems to be driven by interpretations at the officer level in the US patents office as distinct from US legislation.

FASTS does not have the expertise to provide the Committee with the relevant legal analysis of this but if this is, in fact, the case then this may have some implications to Australian patents if �harmonisation� is interpreted broadly and acted upon.

Australian Law Reform Commission Inquiry

The Committee will be aware that the Australia Law Reform Commission is currently reviewing gene patenting and human health. An issues paper and a discussion paper have been released and the final report is due in June 2004.

FASTS considers the ALRC to be a highly credible organisation and the processes of their reviews to be genuinely consultative and comprehensive.

FASTS believes public debate over such an important set of issues as gene patents and consequences for research, human health and ethics should not be constrained or pre-empted by a trade agreement.

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GOVERNMENT PROCUREMENT � Ch. 15

Fasts welcomes the liberalization of access for Australian firms to US Government procurement programs. At face value, this provides opportunities for firms in a variety of advanced technology and the service sectors to benefit. In practice, it is not clear how many Australian firms will benefit due to far to a range of distortions in the procurement process, including US State Government�s interventions in support of local firms.

In addition, there will be extensive costs associated with tendering as appeals mechanisms are used extensively and aggressively. Nevertheless, these provisions are a significant improvement on current arrangements and as such are welcome.

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MOBILITY

A defect in the FTA is the failure to resolve the barriers that constrain labor mobility to the US, specifically business people wishing to work in the USA for periods greater than 6 months. This impacts on Australian businesses, notably, given FASTS interests, R&D intensive technology SMEs trying to expand into the US market.

G’day. I’m getting pretty tense because my book Not happy John! Defending our democracy will be launched on Monday in Canberra, Tuesday in Sydney, Thursday in Melbourne and Friday in Brisbane. Webdiary columnists Harry Heidelberg, Jack Robertson and Antony Loewenstein have each written a chapter. Antony dissected the Hanan Ashrawi affair (see The battle for minds on November 5 and follow-up entries). To refresh your memory, a director of the Sydney Peace Foundation and Prize committtee, Professor Stuart Rees, who also heads Sydney University’s Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies, reflects on the scandal and the politics of media derision.

 

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Revisiting the Hanan Ashrawi affair

by Stuart Rees

Eight months after the award of the 2003 Sydney Peace Prize to the Palestinian academic and human rights campaigner Hanan Ashrawi, it is still painful to revisit that event let alone write about it. Since the August 2003 announcement of the award, as Director of the Sydney Peace Foundation, I had received e mail, phone calls and letters, many hostile, most supportive. The tenor of these personal communications was reflected in letters to newspapers and by the anchor men on call back radio who invited their listeners to take sides over Dr. Ashrawi’s selection.

The involvement of major political figures, the Premier of New South Wales Bob Carr and the Lord Mayor of Sydney Lucy Turnbull and the organization by an Israeli academic of a world wide petition against Dr. Ashrawi receiving the Prize put the issue in national and international spotlights. Premier Carr was involved because he had agreed to present the Prize at the award ceremony in November. The Lord Mayor �s views became an issue when she made public her decision to withdraw the City �s support for Dr. Ashrawi.

Despite the controversy, Hanan Ashrawi left Ramallah on Sunday November 1st, traveled through checkpoints to Jerusalem, and from there to Tel Aviv in the middle of an Israel wide transport strike. She eventually took a British Airways jet from Tel Aviv bound for London�s Heathrow. On arrival and after much negotiation she boarded a Qantas jet for Sydney and landed on the morning of November 4th just hours before Hanan was to deliver the 2003 City of Sydney Peace Prize Lecture.

The following appraisal of ways of thinking and writing focuses on the scornful attitudes of authors who opposed the choice of Dr. Ashrawi. Sections of the media seemed pleased to encourage such writing. Polarized positions were cherished and an understanding free from the call of tribal loyalties was difficult to achieve.

Examples of the use of derision as a way of conducting an argument will be taken from articles inThe Australian and The Sydney Morning Herald and from letters to the editors of those newspapers. I am picking these items to show how editors accepted accusations without foundation, and name calling without caveat or caution. To comprehend why such writing was regarded as worthy of being published requires a recall of the atmosphere which followed the events of September 11th and the subsequent announcement of a war on terror. Before describing that atmosphere, here is a brief profile of the 2004 Sydney Peace Peace Prize recipient.

Balanced person, reasonable choice

Hanan Ashrawi is a Christian woman in a Muslim, male dominated part of the world. The holder of a PhD in literature from a major US university, she had been Dean of Arts at Bir Zeit University, a Minister of Education in the Palestinian Authority and spokesperson for the PLO in the Madrid/ Washington peace talks of 1992. Since that time she had founded MIFTAH a non government institution concerned to foster democracy and good governance within Palestinian society.

Ashrawi is openly hostile to the policies of the Sharon Government. Her perspectives are partisan. Her Israeli critics said she was an absolutist who rejected the idea of Israeli/Palestinian coexistence but her website includes the comment, �The solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict must emanate from a spirit of tolerance and sharing, not one of blind hatred and exclusion�. She has consistently supported a two state solution in the region but remains critical of the implementation of the ‘road map to peace’ because it lessens the prospect of a just outcome.

To assess the invective against her receiving a Peace Prize, a picture can be drawn of Ashrawi as a moderate who had condemned violence and contributed to dialogue about peace. Mary Robinson, the former UN high commissioner for human rights commented, ‘I admire her (Dr.Ashrawi’s) integrity and commitment to seeking a peaceful and just solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict�.She has the respect of the international human rights community for her condemnation of violence on all sides’. Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu said, ‘No one could be more deserving of this prestigious award. Against daunting odds she has remained committed to finding a peaceful solution to what seems an intractable problem’. Madeline Albright former US Secretary of State praised the selection of Dr. Ashrawi and commented, �She is a brilliant spokeswoman for her cause�.

Appraisals of Dr. Ashrawi’s ‘peace record’ also came from significant Israeli citizens. Interviewed on the ABC �s Religion Report of 29th October, the Israeli Meretz MP Yael Dayan said, �Look, as a Palestinian, she is an activist compared to some of the others. But from my point of view, she could have done more, she could have denounced terror more � but she did carry out a dialogue with us Israeli women, which is commendable and certainly peace making.� Baruch Kimmerling a sociologist from the Hebrew University observed that awarding Dr. Ashrawi the prize was an important symbolic act. He wrote, ‘As an Israeli, as a Jew and as an academic I am deeply sorry and ashamed that members of the Australian Jewish community are acting against this rightful nomination’.

A culture of far and intolerance

In many circles a culture of global intolerance was fomenting. In response to the destruction of the twin towers in New York on September 11th 2001, President George W. Bush challenged, �You are either for us or against us�. He implied that there were civilizations and civil peoples, barbaric societies and uncivil peoples. Made more specific,that division translated into Christian democracies versus Muslim autocracies, into responsible democratic Israel confronting irresponsible, dangerous Palestinians. The events of September 11th became a catalyst for thinking in terms of wars against enemies, of good versus evil. Accusation could replace analysis.

The charge of anti semitism merits more detailed attention later in this paper. At this point it is important to say that when such charges became a catch all phrase, they nurtured intolerance. In 2003 the Jewish author Judith Butler wrote in the London Review of Books that following September 11th, the phrase ‘anti semitic’ was being used as a form of censorship which prevented issues such as the ‘the containment and dehumanization of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories from being thoughtfully debated’. In Australia, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict provoked partisanship so intense as to make people take sides and find it difficult to hear others’ perspectives. In discussions with Israeli academics in North America and in Israel six months before the award of the Peace Prize, one colleague warned, �Jewish leaders in the diaspora are often more inflexible, more dogmatic than we would be in Israel�.

Significant Australian observers warned of a culture which encouraged denigration of opponents as though ridicule could be accepted as argument. In November 2003, in an address to the Melbourne Institute, the new Governor General of Australia Lieutenant General Mike Jeffery said that unless debate in Australia became more civilized, a drift towards a destructive polarization of views was inevitable.

A few days earlier in a public address, the actress Judy Davis said, �We are incapable it seems of conducting a civilized conversation with each other. Petty local politics are the order of the day. It is distressing to realize the lengths the supporters of this �new world order� will go in order to control the public debate and vilify great international institutions such as the United Nations’.

A culture of fear and intolerance seemed to invite abusive language and a taken-for-granted assumption that vilifying those you did not agree with was an appropriate way to conduct arguments. At first sight the derision might seem plausible. It was also confusing. The writers identified themselves as respectable professionals or office holders. Violent ways of expressing criticism were presented as though these were not unusual. In the following examples of derision, the adjective �left� crops up as though it means extremist, dangerous, to be condemned and avoided. It is a lazy way of arguing and so routine as to be politically meaningless. Nevertheless it was a stock in trade of those who seemed to think that adjectives should be used as weapons.

Derision as a Form of Argument

To stereotype people as Islamists or as Palestinian apologists and to use ridicule as a way of arguing, is a style which schoolchildren are usually persuaded is inappropriate and inadmissible. A prime example came in an article by Michael Kapel, a member of the board of the Australian/Israel and Jewish affairs Council. Even the title of his article reads like an incitement. �Award raises the volume of terrorist mouthpiece�. He maintained that Hanan Ashrawi was �an apologist for Islamic terror� who had falsely accused Israel of indulging in the cold blooded murder of Palestinian children.

Mr. Kapel then took aim at me. �Rees presents himself as a champion of tolerance, justice and peace for all. That is of course unless they are American or Jewish for whom he reserves little more than undergraduate vilification.’ At the time I did not respond to Mr. Kapel. But his claims merit a response now. In my accounts of the Peace Foundation�s work, I would be ashamed to lump together the members of any one nationality or ethnic group. Over the Ashrawi issue I might have sounded defensive and I certainly pleaded for tolerance and magnanimity. Nevertheless Mr. Kapel claimed that I had �stomped around the media in terms reminiscent of Malaysian leader Dr. Mahathir Mohamed’. Kapel maintained I was �prone to conspiracies and the vilification of those who do not support his extreme views�. One might ask, as calmly as possible, under what circumstances is the promotion of peace with justice ‘extreme’?

The technique of claiming someone’s guilt by virtue of their perceived association with people defined as terrorists, thereby painting a picture of danger, characterized a letter from Martin Guenzl of Perth in The Australian of 29th October. He asked: “Does Sydney really want to laud someone who legitimizes the murder of women and children in their homes?” In similar vein – the assumption that people can be labeled in terms of guilt or innocence, good or bad – Tom Minchin of Victoria wrote in The Australian on November 5th: “She (Dr. Ashrawi) is an apologist for terror who provides terrorists intellectual shelter. As such she is as guilty as those who strap on bombs.”

Paddy McGuiness of The Sydney Morning Herald used an article called �Prizes for Prejudice of a Particular Kind�, to not only scoff at Hanan Ashrawi but dereide the Nobel Peace Prize: “In general the Nobel Prize is comparable in its recipients to the Stalin Prize..� It is clear what the politics of the Sydney Peace Foundation are. They are about claiming the moral high ground for the left, while making excuses for terrorists and warmongers.”

A habit of making sweeping claims as to what sort of people were against Ashrawi receiving the Peace Prize appeared to have the advantage of identifying friends and enemies. Such an either-or way of arguing was not to be impeded by evidence. The claims about the worthiness of critics of the Peace Foundation�s decision implied that those they criticized would be against peace, unable to think, anything but respectable and almost certainly not Jewish. A certain Professor Allan Borowski wrote in a personal letter that the award of the prize would bring its host, the University of Sydney (which was not the host) into great disrepute among the vast majority of decent Australians who abhor all terror and racism and seek a truly just peace in the Middle East. All decent Australians, it seems, would be against Ashrawi winning the Peace Prize which presumably meant that all indecent Australians, who favoured terrorism and racism, would be supporting the Sydney Peace Foundation?

Another example of jumping from one topic to another as though they were connected was also displayed in an article on the front page of The Australian on the weekend of 29th October, �Peace Prize A Betrayal: Officer�s letter from Baghdad�. A Colonel Mike Kelly, described as a senior adviser to coalition forces in Iraq, made connections between attacks by terrorists, injuries to soldiers, the case against an Australian State Premier awarding a peace prize to a Palestinian and the award of this prize as amounting to support for an (undisclosed) enemy�. According to Colonel Kelly, “It would be hard to explain to a soldier who has just lost both his legs in a terrorist attack why an Australian state Premier (supposedly an ally in this war) has been in effect comforting the enemy.”

As if the monolithic arguments of Colonel Kelly and those who decided to publish this material were not sufficient, Government MP Christopher Pyne, chairman of the parliamentary Australia/Israel committee, said: “People like Bob Carr are more dangerous than they realize when they legitimize people who have justified what we describe as terror. Bob Carr is an awful fool in the way that revolutionaries described French aristocrats who helped them against other aristocrats.”

At least Mr. Pyne�s statement had the quality of searching for obscure historical precedent. Others used words and phrases such as �incendiary�, �Arafat booster�, �Israeli bashing�, �rush of blood to the head�, which were inflammatory as well as partisan.

The Australian Jewish Council leader Mr. Colin Rubinstein seemed unable to use moderate language. He claimed that �Mrs Ashrawi was an incendiary who has given unyielding support to violence�. In support of Mr. Rubinstein, an editorial in The Australian of 23rd October said: “Mr. Carr has had a rush of blood to the head, and has agreed to present the Sydney Peace Prize to Palestinian MP and longtime Arafat booster, Hanan Ashrawi.” The same editorial speculated that Carr�s decision had left Labor�s Jewish supporters wondering how deeply the party has been infected by knee jerk Israeli bashing of the Left.

The anti semitism issue

Polarized views included the claim that Jews monopolized the position of victim, which in turn increased the likelihood of charges of anti-semitism, a sensitive issue which needs to be considered in the context of September 11th and the continuing Israel/Palestine conflict.

The Jewish scholar Kimmerling refers to the dominance of a primordial or tribal identity in Israel as opposed to a civil identity based on concepts of universal human and civil rights. Participation in the primordial identity meant that ‘any criticism of Jews, the Jewish state, or its policies, is considered anti-semitic while Jewish traitors are to be vigorously denounced’. Given this atmosphere it was not surprising that support for a controversial Palestinian receiving a Peace Prize was treated in some quarters as being evidence of anti-semitism. Such charges amounted, in Judith Butler’s words, to a form of censorship, the charge ‘anti-semitic’ being so unexceptional that almost anyone and anything could be included.

The writer Bob Ellis addressed the blanket nature of anti-semitism in a letter to The Australian of 29 October, 2003: “Is it being anti semitic to say it is wrong to bulldoze apartment blocks and leave the tenants nowhere to live? Then I swear on the head of my grandmother Rachel Larkman that I am anti-semitic too. Is it anti semitic to say that killing 3000 unarmed Palestinians in three years is wrong and a crime against humanity. Then I swear by the blood of my ancestors all the way back to Abraham that I am anti semitic too.”

In Handing a club to the anti-semites, Phillip Adams wrote in The Australian that he could be an admirer of Hanan Ashrawi and a friend of Israel: “My first daughter, named Rebecca, renounced her father’s atheism and converted to Judaism. And I’ve lost count of the occasions when I’ve launched books by Jewish authors, opened exhibitions by Jewish artists and spoken at Jewish fund raisers or at Holocaust exhibitions or museums.”

Nevertheless the critics kept coming, notably the Minister for Employment and Labor Relations Tony Abbott who addressed the Zionist Council of Victoria and was reported in The Australian of 30th October as saying it was anti-semitism that made many in the West ‘habitual critics of Israel even though it’s the only functioning liberal democracy anywhere in the Middle East’.

A tendency to lump together people by nationality or religious conviction lives alongside assumptions about anti-semitism. Ian Fraser of Rockdale NSW said in The Australian: “In Australia there is a powerful pro Palestinian lobby consisting mostly of Muslims, but also including the far Left. They lobby politicians and vilify anyone who has a good word to say about Israel.” McGuiness in The Sydney Morning Herald wrote that the award to Ashrawi was “yet another manifestation of the anti-semitic strain which lies just below the surface of those who regard themselves as progressives”.

“They prefer to applaud Arab extremists who want to murder Jews � The SPF is not alone in providing monetary rewards for propaganda in Australia.”

Prospects of Dialogue

Seeing everything and everyone as being for or against and using derision and misrepresentation to express such views sucks the oxygen out of any conversation. Such polarization may give an illusion of certainty but precludes enquiry and appraisal of evidence, let alone the beginnings of dialogue.

By contrast there exist perspectives which enhance the prospect of building bridges between peoples such as the leaders of Jewish and Palestinian communities within Australia who were said to be enemies or whom their followers claimed had nothing in common. John Swanston of Kenmore Hills, Queensland in a letter to The Australian of 26th October 2003 sounded a conciliatory note:

“Her visit might just contribute to the peace process by allowing the ignored and despised voice to be heard, listened to and respected. ”

Ashrawi herself subsequently observed: “Blind loyalty for and identification with one side leads to the adoption of strident belligerency towards the other. This intensifies the conflict and subverts rational dialogue.”

Building bridges between peoples requires language that leaves room for interpretation. It requires that touch of humility which allows for consideration of others�` points of view coupled to courage to at least question one�s age old assumptions. The attacks on Hanan Ashrawi displayed few characteristics of dialogue and not much evidence of courage to show even a tinge of doubt. Perhaps the surprising and disappointing feature of this controversy is why those sections of the print media, who regard themselves as mainstream and respectable, facilitated and even encouraged a partisan and gladiatorial way of thinking and writing?

***

References

Adams, Phillip (2003) Handing a club to the ant-semites, The Australian, October, 28th

Ashrawi, Hanan, (2003), Peace not a question of legitimacy, but of humanity, Sydney Morning Herald, November 6th

Butler, Judith (2003) No, it�s not anti semitic, London Review of Books, August 16th

Kapel, Michael; (2003) Award raises the volume of terrorist mouthpiece, The Australian October 29th

Kimmerling, Baruch (2003) Politicide, Ariel Sharon�s war against the Palestinians, London & New York, Verso Press

McGuiness, Padraic (2003) Prizes for prejudice of a particular kind, Sydney Morning Herald, November 11th

Ramsey, Alan (2003) At last some fine words about peace, Sydney Morning Herald, November 1st/2nd

Shanahan, Denis (2003) Peace prize betrayal: officer�s letter from Baghdad, The Weekend Australian, Nov. 1st/2nd

A fuller version of this article will appear in early July in the first edition of the new Arts Commentary Journal EAST WEST.